[on her character "Nova" in
O Planeta dos Macacos (1968)] I felt very intuitive that my particular personality and nature were
like Nova. Automatically, I'd say that's about 80% of the part. The
director, the producer and the writer talked with me about her, and
they described her as "sub-human." We hadn't really had an actress play
"sub-human" before. Nova's not like
Raquel Welch's character
in
Mil Séculos Antes de Cristo (1966). She was more primitive because
of the apes' suppression. We played it by ear and experimented. It was
really a moment-to-moment thing.