Cynthia Nixon gave Sarah Jessica Parker a heads up that she would be running for governor — but Parker admits she was still surprised by the decision.
“I didn’t [anticipate] that she would seek a gubernatorial seat,” the Divorce star revealed at a retrospective on her career at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival in New York City on Friday. “She shared with me that she was going to announce about a month before.”
“I was incredibly excited and proud of her. I think she’s already been good for the conversation,” the 53-year-old actress added.
Mike Coppola/Getty Images for Tribeca Film Festival
Parker also explained that she and Nixon formed a close friendship while working as child actresses and that Nixon, 52, has “been an activist her entire life.”
“She’s incredibly bright. She loves this city, she’s been involved in conversations about policies that have been really important to her for many years: Education, public schools, housing… the larger issues that are part of conversations that affect us here [in the city] and upstate as well,” Parker said, noting she thinks it’s a “good” thing that Nixon stepped up to run against current New York Governor Andrew Cuomo in the upcoming Democratic primary.
The New York Times reports that Cuomo currently leads Nixon in the polls by 31 points with a projected 58 percent as opposed to her 27 percent but Parker, who starred alongside Nixon on six seasons of Sex and the City, is “excited” by the race.
“This is what’s exciting about primaries, right? People can inspire an incumbent to reconsider policy… or just have a robust conversation,” she shared. “She’s formidable. She’s incredibly bright. She’s really brave. She’s excited about this race and it’s challenging. But, she seems enormously energized and I think it’s good for us to have a competitor — it’s always good. A challenger is good.”
ET caught up with Parker at the Tribeca Film Festival premiere of her new film, Blue Night, earlier this month, where she said she hopes people can separate actress Nixon from gubernatorial candidate Nixon.
“Well we have to separate Cynthia from all the extraordinary acting she’s done,” Parker stressed. “I think her candidacy is exciting for a lot of people and even the Democratic Party… So I think it’s exciting and I think she’s an incredibly bright, extraordinary woman.”
See more in the video below.
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