Why Winona Ryder Is Heading To TV

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Winona Ryder is a fairly big name in showbiz, but her fame has mostly come from her projects on the big screen. In fact, aside from a role in the 2015 miniseries Show Me a Hero, her TV appearances have been almost exclusively for one-off roles. Now, she's making a big jump into TV with a major role in the upcoming Netflix show Stranger Things. According to Ryder, the time was right for her to try out a new type of role within a new medium. Here's what she had to say:

As an actress, you go where the stories are. I don't really care where it's seen, at this point. I just want to tell good stories and do good roles that I haven't done before. No one is banging my door down to be a superhero. I don't know how good I would be. I have low bone density, so I don't know if anyone really wants to put me in a cape and chuck me out a window. But a lot of my friends, who are great actors and who come from film, are doing TV because that's where the opportunities are. For us, it does feel like it's similar to making the movies that we used to make. It's just that now they're on a different format because they aren't making those kinds of films anymore. Well, they are, but they're real exceptions when they do. If you're not lucky enough to get cast in one of those, you go where the storytelling is. [Stranger Things] is a genre that I've never tried before. It's fun, and there's a lot of different stuff going on.

Winona Ryder revealed her rationale for taking the part in Stranger Things in a chat with Collider, and it's good to know that she's not an actress who considers a move to TV as a step down from film. Movie stars have definitely been flocking to the small screen in recent years, ranging from Matthew McConaughey on HBO for True Detective to Maggie Gyllenhaal for BBC's The Honourable Woman to Kevin Spacey for House of Cards on Netflix. There are more great roles than ever on TV nowadays, so it's only right that great actors should sign on for the parts. Stranger Things could be a game-changer for Ryder's career.

Stranger Things will be a supernatural drama that includes some good old-fashioned government conspiracies and a creepy young girl. Set in the 80s, the show has been described as an homage to movies of that era and will feel like a hybrid of films such as Poltergeist, Goonies, and E.T. Winona Ryder will play a mom whose son has gone missing.

The series is currently only set for one season on Netflix, but Winona Ryder's Stranger Things co-star Matthew Modine has said that he expects a second season to be in the works. Season 1 will be released on July 15 on Netflix, so be sure to tune in to catch Ryder in her big move to TV. In addition, you can check out all of Netflix's upcoming premieres here.

Laura Hurley
Laura Hurley
Senior Content Producer

Laura turned a lifelong love of television into a valid reason to write and think about TV on a daily basis. She's not a doctor, lawyer, or detective, but watches a lot of them in primetime. CinemaBlend's resident expert and interviewer for One Chicago, the galaxy far, far away, and a variety of other primetime television. Will not time travel and can cite multiple TV shows to explain why. She does, however, want to believe that she can sneak references to The X-Files into daily conversation (and author bios).