Sigourney Weaver Was Initially Unimpressed with How She Delivered Her Iconic ‘Get Away from Her, You Bitch’ Line in Aliens

Sigourney Weaver says she wasn’t initially happy with one of her most iconic movie lines.

Weaver, 76, reflected on the line — as well as her decades-long career — during a recent panel at New York Comic Con moderated by Josh Horowitz, host of the Happy Sad Confused podcast. During the conversation, Horowitz asked the actress how she felt about a fan-favorite line from 1986’s sci-fi classic Aliens, the sequel to the 1979 film Alien. 

The line occurs when the film’s protagonist, Ripley (Weaver), emerges from an elevator in a giant metal bodysuit, ready to fight a terrifying alien to save a young child. As she approaches the monster, she resolutely says, “Get away from her, you bitch!”

However, Weaver said she wasn’t satisfied with her delivery at the time.

“I just remember, you know, by that time [during filming], we were in these big set pieces, and basically it took a lot of work for the crew to open the [elevator] door and have me in the power motor with [special effects designer] John [Richardson] behind me lifting the legs,” she recalled.

She continued, “Everything was rehearsed and everything was in sync. I felt I basically had only one or two chances [to get the line right]. And I remember when I said the line, I said something like, ‘Get away from her you [pitching her voice up] bitch!’ “ 

“I [pitched] up, which is not really what you’re supposed to do. You wanna sound brave. You should go down, and I went up, like a little nerd,” she said.

But she said that director James (Jim) Cameron didn’t seem to notice.

“Jim loved it, and we didn’t really get to do it again. Maybe one other time, but not very much. It was such a huge sequence,” she added.

Critics and audiences also didn’t seem to mind — Weaver ultimately received an Oscar nomination for her performance, which she said she didn’t expect due to the fact that roles in genre movies rarely get recognized for such awards.

“I think I was surprised because it was very unheard of — and still kind of would be,” she explained. “But I knew that Jim had created the structure of character and the story so that it was meaningful to people, and so I was delighted to be in a genre picture that didn’t skip over all of that. And just for the story and everything else, regardless of the genre, it was embraced by the Academy.”

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As for whether the Galaxy Quest star would ever reprise her role as the iconic heroine Ripley? She said she’s not opposed to it, and has even read a promising concept for a new film.

“You know, [writer/producer] Walter Hill is a very good friend of mine, and he wrote 50 pages of where Ripley would be now, and they are quite extraordinary,” she said. 

“So I don’t know if it’s going to happen, but I have had a meeting with Fox, Disney or whoever it is now,” Weaver continued to laughter, adding, “I have never felt the need [to reprise the role.] I was always like, ‘Let her rest, let her recover.’ But what Walter has written seems so true to me.”

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Weaver’s Ripley is the only character to survive the original 1979 movie, and she became the franchise’s hero over its next three films. She has not played the part on the big screen since 1997’s Alien: Resurrection.