Jessica Chastain reunited with two of her costars in the 2011 movie The Help, Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer, on Thursday as she received a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame.
Chastain portrayed Celia Foote in the drama based on Kathryn Stockett’s novel of the same name about a white journalist chronicling the lives of Black maids working for white households in 1960s Mississippi. Davis played maid Aibileen Clark, who works for Ahna O’Reilly’s Elizabeth Leefolt, while Spencer played Minny Jackson, the servant of Bryce Dallas Howard‘s racist Hilly Holbrook until she finds a job with Foote.
The trio posed for photographs together, and Davis was one of the speakers who paid tribute.
Dale Robinette
Jessica Chastain and Octavia Spencer star in 2011’s ‘The Help’
Davis mentioned a scene in the movie where Chastain’s character, who’s new to town and desperately trying to fit in, knocks on the door of “Ms. Hilly” during a Junior League meeting. But instead of letting her in, the women hide from Foote.
“In that moment, despite the outward differences, you were me,” Davis said. “You were any woman who felt unworthy, wanting to belong. Jessica, you understand the task of being an artist. And I love how you do what you do. How you and your work can present women we’ve always put in a box and how you quietly invite us into their souls to experience their why. You shift us, confront us, wake us up, and we do, because we must. How can you not when you see an artist dip the brush into their own soul?”
Davis noted that people are separated by gender, race, and other factors.
“And I said to you — and maybe you don’t remember — about how alone I felt,” she explained. “And you said, ‘Viola, never feel alone. This is my email. This is my address, phone number. You contact me. I will always be there.'”
As a human and an artist, Davis said that Chastain understands “the revolutionary act of making people feel less alone.”
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While Davis obviously has maintained a relationship with Chastain, she’s since spoken out against the movie itself.
“There’s no one who’s not entertained by The Help,” Davis told Vanity Fair in July 2020. “But there’s a part of me that feels like I betrayed myself, and my people, because I was in a movie that wasn’t ready to [tell the whole truth].” She noted that it was “created in the filter and the cesspool of systemic racism,” while other critics have called out its “white savior” storyline.
As she concluded her speech toasting her former costar, Davis called the newest recipient her “beautiful friend.”
She added, “I’m honored to know you, and I’m honored to experience your greatness, and I’m honored to be alive when you are.”
See the full ceremony above.
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