GETTING PERSONAL WITH WINONA RYDER 'GIRL, INTERRUPTED' STAR SHARES HER OWN DARK SIDE.

Byline: Glenn Whipp Film Writer

For the past six years, Winona Ryder has shepherded her new film, ``Girl, Interrupted,'' through development hell, sticking with it as executive producer through various rewrites, directorial changes and studio upheavals.

It wasn't just that Ryder liked the film's source material, Susanna Kaysen's memoir about her two-year stay in a psychiatric facility. There's a personal connection as well: Ryder says she could have been Kaysen at one point in her adolescence. In fact, she checked herself into a psychiatric ward when she was 19, suffering from anxiety attacks and exhaustion.

``I had no idea what was happening to me, and what was worse, I didn't feel like I could tell anybody about what I was feeling,'' Ryder says. ``So here I was, 19, and I felt totally scared and totally alone. I tell you, at that point in my life, Susanna's book would have been a lifesaver.''

And that's why she made the movie. Here, Ryder talks about her difficulties shaking the experience of playing Kaysen, the daunting challenge of facing 30, and why Ronald Reagan isn't her favorite president.

--Q: You've never talked about your struggle with depression before. Why now?

--A: Why, indeed? It is strange to talk about it. I know how nauseating it is when actors complain about their lives. We're sickeningly well-paid people who have very charmed lives.

--Q: But ...

--A: But that doesn't mean you don't have any problems. I grew up in front of everybody. I had my first period, literally, on film. My whole life was amplified for public consumption. And every time I complained about it, I was called spoiled. So I learned that I wasn't supposed to say anything.

So when I was 19 and had made probably too many movies in too short a span, I started having this horrible time. My heart would be going at 90 miles per hour, my breathing would get labored, and I'd be sweating buckets. And I was lonely and confused and going through what every teen-ager goes through, facing those big questions as you exit your adolescence. Why am I here? What is this world? Where do I belong?

--Q: Questions that no one can answer for you.

--A: It was like that feeling when you're almost in a car crash, and you swerve, and for a second there are needles going through your head and all through your body. It's like that, only instead of lasting a second or two, it lasted a much longer time.

--Q: How did you get over it?

--A: Time. Time and a great shrink.

--Q: Obviously then, you felt a connection with Susanna Kaysen's book and her own adolescent struggles.

--A: To me, she nailed everything about that time in your life that is so confusing and so lonely and so oddly funny and weird. And she captured it with such honesty and without being self-indulgent, which is something I hadn't seen since Salinger wrote about it in ``Catcher in the Rye.'' And that's saying a lot.

--Q: And, as an added bonus for you, she did it from a female perspective.

--A: Yes. Rebels in books are usually saved for the boys. There really aren't a lot of female rebels. We're usually stuck with Judy Bloom, you know? And in films, we aren't really offered much at all. We're given movies like ``Runaway Bride'' and sent on our way.

--Q: Now, you have a few rebellious moments in the movie, but most of the heavy lifting is left to Angelina Jolie. Do you have much of a wild side yourself?

--A: It's something I'd like to explore someday - on film. But I don't know what life would be like lived that way. I'm pretty happy with my life as it is.

--Q: Attitudes regarding depression have changed a lot since 1967, the year the movie is set.

--A: We've definitely done a 360. Back then, if you were confused or sensitive or rebelled at all, you were locked up and medicated, and they basically threw away the key - especially if you were a woman. But now, what's so amazing is that the maximum they can hold you, no matter what your malady is - suicidal, schizophrenic, manic-depressive - is 21 days. Thanks to Reagan, that's the most we have funding for. Reagan (screwed) us. Reagan (screwed) us bad.

--Q: You have so much passion about both the movie and its subject. Was it hard to let it go?

--A: I've never been closer to a movie, and it was hard to shake, definitely. There are still remnants of Susanna in me and in my home.

--Q: Like what?

--A: It's hard to describe, but I made these collages of photographs and pictures, stuff from Life and Look magazines of things that were going on in 1967. And I saved them all and brought them home and put them up in my house. Really, I've just sort of stayed in Susanna's framework and decorated this cage for her to live in and brought it back with me. It's almost like she's this weird sort of pet that I have, you know, and I just can't set her free.

--Q: Wow. How long has it been since you finished the film?

--A: April. And she's still right here. It's a weird thing. I don't want to lose the part of me that can be her. I'll just miss her too much, you know? I guess I'll always have the movie.

--Q: It sounds like you've been spoiled for other movies.

Ryder: I just finished a movie a couple of weeks ago with Richard Gere. It's called ``Autumn in New York.'' And, you know, comparatively, it didn't come close. ``Girl, Interrupted,'' not to use such a cliche, but it was a real labor of love. And then it felt like I went and did a movie that I was hired to do. And I went to work, and I did my job. It wasn't a bad experience, but it didn't go beyond me just doing the job.

--Q: So are you trying to find another labor of love?

--A: I optioned a book a couple of years ago called ``Roustabout,'' which is about the death of the small circuses that move from town to town. And I've been trying to get it made for a while now.

--Q: Are you heading for another six-year journey?

--A: (Laughs) I hope not! But if that's what it takes, I'm willing to put in the work.

--Q: Brittany Murphy (one of Ryder's co-stars in ``Girl, Interrupted'') cites you as a huge influence ...

--A: God ...

--Q: She says she grew up with you singing ``My Sharona'' in ``Reality Bites.'' How does that make you feel?

--A: Old! And I just turned 28, so I'm, like, on the doorstep of 30.

--Q: Well, you do have two years to cross the threshold.

--A: But you can't helping thinking about it, if only just a little bit. When you're 27, you can still say you're in your mid-20s. Now, I'm in my late 20s, and it's, like, there are no more excuses. You can't say, 'Oh, well, I'm young.' You're not young anymore. So you better start dealing with stuff.

--Q: Like what? Marriage, kids, white picket fences? (Ryder has been dating actor Matt Damon for nearly two years.)

--A: Um ... maybe you're right. I do have two years to cross the threshold.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo: (1 -- color -- cover illustration) Alone in the world

Winona Ryder revisits the confusion and isolation of post-adolescence in 'Girl, Interrupted'

(2) Winona Ryder as Susanna Kaysen (no cutline)