Without question, 2025 belongs to Demi Moore. Her transformative turn as Elisabeth Sparkle in The Substance not only resulted in a richly deserved slew of awards and nominations, but ignited a conversation about self-acceptance, aging, and body image in a way that’s never felt more relevant. Then, at January’s Golden Globes, she gave an impassioned speech while accepting the award for best female actor in a motion picture, revealing that 30 years ago, she had a producer tell her she was a “popcorn actress,” essentially meaning she was good for blockbusters that were commercially successful but probably wouldn’t ever be recognized for deeper, more artistic contributions.
“That corroded me to the point where I thought…Maybe this was it. Maybe I’d done what I was supposed to do,” Moore said before adding that she had to stop measuring herself against unrealistic ideals and learn the value of her worth. Those words reverberated with an entire generation of women who for too long have been pigeonholed or underestimated.
But Moore’s real success doesn’t just stem from the past 12 months—although what a year it’s been in terms of sheer diversity of the roles the 62-year-old embodied! In The Substance, she played an Oscar-winning actor who has seen her star fade. Thinking her best years are behind her, she responds to an ad for an experimental drug that promises to transform her into a “better version” of herself, but instead results in devastating consequences. There was also her captivating turn as midcentury New York socialite Ann Woodward in Ryan Murphy’s limited series Feud: Capote vs. the Swans and her starring role in Taylor Sheridan’s West Texas oil drama Landman (with season two premiering on Paramount+ on November 16), twang and all.
And then there was Moore’s Oscar nomination, the first in her storied career. Although the award went to relative newcomer Mikey Madison, Moore—the favored front-runner—didn’t sulk and slink out. Instead, she joyously hit Vanity Fair’s post-Oscar party with her three daughters, ready to celebrate.
But, as we’ve witnessed in real time, the actor has spent more than four incredible decades working up to this moment. Whether it be St. Elmo’s Fire, Ghost, A Few Good Men, G.I. Jane, or Striptease (where she became the first woman in Hollywood to break the $10 million salary barrier), she has shown tenacity, strength, and a gift for bringing tough yet emotionally complex women to life.
That tenacity and strength has been as evident off-screen too. Raising her three daughters amid the intense public spotlight, along with showcasing the relationship she has with her blended family of ex-husband Bruce Willis, his wife, Emma Heming, and daughters Rumer, Scout, and Tallulah, is genuinely inspiring—especially now, as Willis battles frontotemporal dementia.
That quiet power is on full display when she sits down with Substance costar Margaret Qualley for her Glamour Women of the Year interview. As she dishes out sound-bite-perfect advice over the course of almost an hour, it’s hard not to wonder if she’s available for individual therapy sessions.
Moore had just returned from Milan, where she made her debut in The Tiger, a 30-minute short fashion film directed by Spike Jonze and Halina Reijn. Moore plays Barbara Gucci—the fictional head of Gucci International, which also owns the state of California—in the star-studded collaboration that also doubled as a fashion show for Demna’s first collection as Gucci’s creative director. “Spike had this idea that [my character is] having this anxiety dream, and that idea of what goes on inside us versus what we put out for everyone else to see,” she says. “It was such a fun, amazing experience.”
Of course, as public as Demi Moore is, there is a lot we don’t see. The actor revealed personal demons and past struggles, such as addiction and childhood trauma, in her 2019 New York Times best-selling memoir, Inside Out. But at this point in her life, Moore is learning to be more open about the realities that come with being one of Hollywood’s all-time biggest stars.
“If something didn’t go exactly as I’d like or wasn’t what I had hoped for, [I now know,] ‘Yeah, that was a disappointment, but I’m not a disappointment,’” Moore says. “That’s a huge difference.”
She credits daily meditation and spending time at her Idaho home for helping her tune the noise out. There’s also her micro chihuahua, Pilaf, who is by her side always. “With everything I’ve been through, which has been a lot, I wouldn’t trade where I am today. And the thing that I feel like I have today that I certainly didn’t have when I was younger was the freedom to know that I don’t have to have the answer and that life is not going to be completely stolen from me if I somehow don’t know.”
And so, as one of Glamour’s 2025 Global Women of the Year, Moore sits down with Qualley, the actor and daughter of her St. Elmo’s Fire costar Andie MacDowell, to reflect on the year that’s been, why Landman season two pushes her outside her comfort zone, and what her signature long hair means to her now. —Jessica Radloff, senior West Coast editor
Margaret Qualley: I’m so happy to see you.
Demi Moore: Same.
It’s been too long.
I know. A little text, which always fills me, but seeing your face—we need to do that more often.
No, I feel so grateful that I have a full 40 minutes of Demi in this moment. I’m going to soak up every second. If we’re going all the way back, what made you start down this path? You had a hunger, you had an ambition, you had a desire, but what was your North Star? Did you know what your North Star was? Were you just running? What did it feel like in adolescence as you were coming towards where you arrived?
I didn’t necessarily have a North Star. I was looking for a direction, and I met this young woman who was just a couple of years older, who lived in the same apartment building with her single mother, as I was. And I remember looking down from the balcony and she was out by the pool. She was a German girl, and she was so comfortable in her own skin. She seemed so self-possessed, and she was so stunning. And it was like I didn’t know what she had, but I wanted that. And we became friends. She spoke English well but wasn’t confident in reading. So she would have me read scripts aloud to her.
So as I was reading the scripts aloud, we did a lot of things together as two teenagers in West Hollywood with our single moms. Then she left to go back to Europe to shoot the film test. This was Nastassja Kinski. And as she left, I turned that reflection back on myself, the desire of wanting what she had. It wasn’t so much that she was an actress, it was that there was a comfort she had in herself that I wanted. And that’s what moved me in the direction. And so in my teenage mind, it was in the idea of, “Well, she was pursuing this, maybe I could do that.” And I became very strategic and very practical about what you have to do. And then that became, in a way, the North Star—was it even possible? How far can I go? What do I have to do to get there?
Okay, so then you’re off to the races, you’re running full steam ahead?
Yeah, I do think running is a key element. I was also desiring to be independent and away from my mother. There was a real drive to be self-sufficient. I was already working regular jobs to do that.
What were they?
My first job was working at a collection agency where I was on the phone. So I had to call people who hadn’t paid their bills. And because I had such a low deep voice, they didn’t know that I was, like, 14 years old. Then I moved out on my own at 16. I didn’t do the typical [thing], which was working in a restaurant. Mine were office-oriented jobs. I worked for an accountant. I was a receptionist at 20th Century Fox for a producer who worked for Aaron Spelling. It was being in the [Hollywood] world but not in the world, very humbling. Being able to watch it from an objective point of view and going, “This isn’t where I’m going to stay.” I had much bigger designs.
You believed in yourself. You worked your ass off. It happened. And I imagine the dreams shift, the dreams become bigger, and then those come true and then they become bigger and those come true. Was there ever a point at which you achieved something that you thought you wanted, only to realize that the dream had expired?
Well, it was a realization after striving, working hard, having the good fortune of certain films, having really enormous success, and that [was] able to keep moving me forward and giving me even greater opportunities. And then certain personal things happen. My mother died, my marriage ended, and I stepped back from work to be with my kids. And there was a moment I realized that my own success—which had been a real driving thrust, a real motivation—wasn’t enough.
I had to reconnect with what moved me—why was I really doing this? We know that outside success is never the answer. And so I think recalibrating took me quite a while to really find the place in me that felt that what I had to offer from my inside was worthy of striving to do meaningful work.
Okay, now I’m going to shift into some questions I’d like to know that are not quite as deep.
Okay.
How’d you get your hair so long? It’s been like this for a while.
Yeah, I think after I shaved my head when I did G.I. Jane, which was a very powerful experience on many levels, but I just started to let it grow. And it also kind of coincided with stepping back from work to be with my kids. I just started to let my hair grow. And I think probably because I’m also lazy and I don’t like to sit in the chair or have to go and get it done a lot.
[We often hear] that as women get older, they shouldn’t have long hair. And for some reason, to me, I didn’t buy it. I didn’t believe it, and it didn’t make sense to me why that had to be the case. And I did notice, particularly women who were going through menopause, that they were…I was looking around and seeing they all were kind of cutting their hair in a very almost masculine way, just desexualizing themselves. And so I think there was a combination of this attachment to it too. I don’t know. Sometimes I think I’ve just willed it.
Willing the hair. Okay. Now I want to get into Landman. How does it feel to have it come out?
It’s a totally new experience for me. I’d never done a series. And it was an interesting character. I loved stepping into this whole subculture of the oil industry being in Fort Worth, being in the actual environment. And it’s a great group. Billy Bob [Thornton], Ali Larter, Andy Garcia, Sam Elliott. It’s been a really fun exploration and experience, which I think in some ways pushed me out of my comfort zone [in a way that’s] different from The Substance. You’ve done a series—the pace is different and [you don’t know where] the show is going.
To be shooting 10 episodes and have no idea where it’s going challenges your sense of control. As an actor, it’d be like going into a movie, but not knowing what the ending is. But doing the accent, playing this woman was a lot of fun for me. It had a lightness in the seriousness.
You’ve had so much success. You have beautiful girls—your children—you were nominated for an Oscar this year. You’ve given one of the most courageous performances of all time. Are you just taking life as it comes? Does the work feel peaceful, or does it feel like you still have something you’re aching to share? How do you feel?
I think the thing is, I feel in some ways so much more energized right now. And from a place that’s so much more whole that it feels really exciting to really open the lens of possibility. I don’t know what that looks like. I look at someone like Helen Mirren and I think, Oh my God, she’s in her 80s. And look at how dynamic—and the work that she’s doing, the diversity of the work she’s doing. And it says to me, Oh we’ve still got a lot to do.
I was hoping that was going to be your answer because I’m excited to see what you do next and watch.
I mean, I will say I think that there is not as much available for someone my age as there is for someone in their 30s. And it’s not a complaint, it’s just an observation. And it just means that if I want to keep doing the kind of things that I’d like to do, then it might mean that I have to work a little harder, that I might need to work in a different way to find the material I want to do, or that I can’t just sit back and wait. It’s not over until you decide it’s over. And it may change and it may look different, but it’s there if you want to keep striving for it. But you have to want it. And sometimes I think we have to step back to reengage.
Talk to me about your speech at the Golden Globes.
Why I think it resonated is that it’s about the idea of giving our power away. That idea that you will never be enough, but that you can know the value of your worth if you put down the measuring stick. I didn’t actually prepare the speech at all. I didn’t even think I was going to win. I had thought about that idea of that story, and I had thought about that idea that I had believed that I was somebody that didn’t get awards. That I could have success, but not that other kind, that I couldn’t be acknowledged.
What I want to add, though, is about, for me, the gift in meeting, working with, and spending so much time with you. What I realized is that while I may be older and I’ve had more chronological time on this earth, the thing I always look to remember is that I’m still the student. And there’s so much I learned just through my experience of working with you and seeing how you approach things, how you held things, the value you held for yourself and your encouragement of me. That to me is the heart of what true sisterhood is, which is the [Women of the Year] theme this year. Knowing that I could call and ask you to do this and you would show up for me.
When I think back to The Substance experience, the diamond in there is 1,000% you. You had my back, and I had yours. And there was such beauty in that. It is a remarkable experience having you as a friend on this earth. And I know that this is just the beginning for us, because of moments like today when I’m like—believe it or not—I needed this interview more than you did.
I’m always happy to share my experience, strength, and hope, knowing that I am not an expert. I, too, am just on the path of finding my way. One step forward, couple of steps back, one step forward, couple of steps back. It’s just embracing those moments that we see as low or failures, as they’re also the gifts. They do hold the gems.
Margaret Qualley is known for her bold, genre-spanning performances across film and television. From her breakout role in HBO’s The Leftovers to standout turns in the Academy Award Best Picture nominee The Substance, for which she earned Golden Globe and SAG nominations, Ethan Coen’s Honey Don't and her Emmy-nominated performance in Netflix’s Maid, she continues to establish herself as one of the most dynamic actors of her generation.
Photographer: Thomas Whiteside @thomaswhiteside
Stylist: Brad Goreski @bradgoreski
Hair: Dimitris Giannetos @dimitrishair
Makeup: Rokael Lizama @rokaelbeauty
Manicure: Zola Ganzorigt @nailsbyzola
Set Design: Jeremy Reimnitz @jeremyreimnitz
Production: Petty Cash Productions @petty_cash_production
Read Glamour’s other global Women of the Year cover story on Tyla, and be sure to check back on 10/27 for the rest of our 2025 honorees.
