Pleased to welcome Sandra Bullock to this program.

The talented actress and producer just completed one of the most successful,

prolific years, I could add, that anyone could ever hope for in this business.

This Sunday night she has the rare distinction of being nominated

for a Golden Globe in both the comedy and drama category.

From one of those nominated roles, here she is in "The Blind Side."

I was thinking yesterday in advance of our conversation, Sandra,

about the number of women, respectfully, who I've interviewed on this program

over seven seasons who get to a certain age, and have said to me

in this very chair countless times there aren't quality roles

in this business for women of a certain age.

You pulled off two in one year. What do you make of that?

I don't know what to make of it.

I just don't think there's a lot of quality roles for both men and women, but...

There weren't for women, but then someone was smart enough to start writing them

and I'm sure it was on spec, going,

"No one will ever pay me to write this script," so they do it on the sly.

I think the writer's strike and the actor's strike

probably turned out a lot of great work.

You know what, someone started writing it. It's like if you build it,

they will come. If you write a great story with a great role,

no matter if it's male or female, I think people go.

I don't, you know? I was talking to someone the other day...

The perception of Meryl Streep is seasoned actress,

and then she does something like "The River Wild",

and she becomes a badass action hero on the water, and that's Meryl Streep.

No one was going to let her do that, but she wanted to and she did it

and it made tons of money. And they went, "Oh. Oh, okay."

When you saw... let me just take them one at a time,

we'll cover "The Blind Side" first.

When you saw the script for this, two things:

What pulled you to it, and just between the two of us, did you know..?

-Yeah, because no one else's listening. -Yeah, exactly, nobody else.

Did you have any idea it would hit the way it has?

Mm-mmm.

For about eight months to 10 months I was saying no a lot.

I kept turning it down. I don't know if it was where I was in my head.

It was beautifully written. I got it. I said,

"All the elements are here for a great story.

I don't know how to pull her off. I don't know how to do this

without making it a cartoon."

I didn't want it to become cheesy, for lack of a better word.

But our director, John Lee Hancock, who I have to give all the credit to,

hands down, this was his baby for two years

and he spent time with the family. He just kept coming back and finally said,

"Just meet the woman before you say no again,"

and I said, "Fine, I'll go meet her,"

because I was kind of close to Memphis.

So I met her, and after a day with Leigh Anne Tuohy,

to say life was never the same in that I finally met someone

who is more manic and driven than I was to get stuff done in life

not in work, but in life. That's an understatement

I still didn't agree to do the film

but somehow I think I was scared enough

to step up to the plate to try, because it's an amazing story.

The fact that it is true, if it was told perfectly,

which most of the time films aren't,

then it could be something that left the world in a better place. You know?

It's nice to leave good things behind in your work

rather than just something that's going to make your paycheck or be a trend.

So...

I don't know when I said yes. I still don't recall.

I remember how scared I was, I remember the first day of shooting,

thinking, I shouldn't have done this film,

I'm not making this scene work, I don't know what's happening.

Really dreading it because I thought I was going to ruin

an already amazing story.

This is my word, not yours, but I think the sentiment you're expressing

I think this word captures the sentiment.

There was an intimidation that you felt by this script,

and you've spoken to that now a couple of times. What was that?

When you read something that was already done beautifully

in real life by this family, and then we're getting ready

to copy it on film, if you don't copy it beautifully and perfectly,

having all those elements there... and it's not just you.

It's the direction, it's the cinematography,

it's how the story's told, all the cast, everything.

If it's not pitch perfect, you're going to do harm

to a story that's already brilliant.

They didn't want a story made. They didn't want a book written about them.

They just did what they did out of love,

because that was their destiny in life and their calling.

I didn't want to be responsible for destroying something

that was already beautiful.

And I didn't know how to make it better than it already was.

The viewers of this show know, because I reference it all the time,

some of the most fascinating conversations I have,

as is the case for any brother, you have in the barbershop.

Because the brothers hang out in the barbershop

-and we talk about everything. -Women, it's in the bathroom.

Same thing? Okay, bathroom. Brothers in the barbershop, women in the bathroom.

So in the barbershop, when the trailer...

I remember being in the barbershop,

literally, when these trailers started running,

and all the brothers in the barbershop had their opinions.

Some brother hollers out, "Another movie about White folk,"

if I can quote Harry Reid, "saving Negroes."

Another movie about White folk saving Negroes.

-I know you've heard this before. -Yeah, I heard it from...

-you know who Luenell is, the comedian? -Absolutely.

-She said that to me. -Luenell. She's funny.

She said, "I thought you were," and I said...

"I love her, she doesn't sugar-coat a thing."

I said, "Thanks for the support."

I know it's a true story and this is not your burden to bear,

but I raise this because I think it is Hollywood's burden to bear.

The response is it's a true story. Yes, it is a true story.

There are all kinds of true stories about Black folk that this

-town would never make. -Yup.

So the answer can't be just it's a true story.

Tell me what you think when you hear people say

why they got to keep making movies of White folks saving Negroes?

Yeah, yeah. Good question.

I don't know. I don't know.

There's so many amazing stories that deserve to be told about women.

-We don't get our stories told either. -Fair enough.

When we're in the bathroom and we see the trailer to another...

We go, "Why is this another story about a male action

hero gets to save the day and the women don't?"

-Yeah, yeah, exactly. -Again, it's money.

It's what people want to go see. But guess what?

People want to go see anything that's well-told.

I think it's timing in that we needed something good for the soul.

Honestly, I didn't look at it as a Black-White issue.

To me it was like, can you take someone off the street

and trust your love and trust that person within your home

and give that much of yourself.

And it'd be just about love, about taking care of your community,

about your fellow man, about your friends, your family?

Would people take in their neighbor if their neighbor

was in tough times and love them like they were your own?

So many people do that, not just Black-White. It has nothing...

To me it had nothing to do with color,

it had to do with loving your children.

So many people don't take care of their own children.

So this family was blind to what came after them

later on in terms of it's a White family going after a Black kid, saving.

It just... as Leigh Anne said, it wasn't White lady

going after the Black kid, she goes, "It was the mom looking at the child

who was cold walking home that night, and then it never became a question."

As Sean Tuohy said, he just became the ATM for Leigh Anne

building the bedroom, making this home,

and giving the brother and sister, S.J. and Collins, their brother.

You know, not brother, but their brother.

-That was very nice, yeah. -That's what to me...

Well, to me it's...

So many conversations can come from this. I just go,

Why is it that we question an act of love?

We don't question an act of violence. We sort of like, yeah,

it's understandable, look at...

We're so happy to talk about violence,

we're so quick to question love and someone's good intentions,