INTERVIEW WITH SANDRA BULLOCK ON THE MAKING OF PRACTICAL MAGIC

(From Entertainment Tonight)

Her roles in 'Speed' and 'While You Were Sleeping' put her on the A-list of Hollywood's favorite young actresses. Now, with her latest film 'Practical Magic' set to open, SANDRA BULLOCK is ready to talk about her career, her life off-screen and more. America's Sweetheart opens up to Mary Hart in a revealing, one-on-one interview about why she left Hollywood and those romance rumors with MATTHEW McCONAUGHEY!

Mary Hart: Do you believe in witchcraft?

Sandra Bullock: I don't even know what witchcraft is. I mean I believe in certain elements of the mystic or the unexplained or intuition, or fate, you know that seventh, eighth, ninth sense. You know so many things are coincidental. Sometimes I really start to wonder and I think we're such a logical society that we need to have proof of everything. We're like the mad scientists. If we don't have logical proof, we don't believe it. Too many things have happened in my life that just do not make any sense. I'd like to think that it was something other than me... or timing.

Mary: You're producing a lot now. I didn't realize that you weren't going to act for the next year. Are these things that you foresaw or planned for yourself?

Sandra: We started this four years ago and we started developing material, finding new writers and it's taken us this long, with whatever writers we started out with, to bring each project to fruition. It's not your obvious material. It's stuff that we're crazy about. But it's not your big commercial vehicles. They're smaller things; more independent films which can be equally as successful but there's not that weight on us where we feel we have to churn out something that makes a massive amount of money at this point.

Mary: But the commercial element is extremely important too.

Sandra: Eventually, yeah, but I think if you have a great script and you have great actors and it's well directed and it's a really good film, it finds an audience. I think that has shown itself to be more prevalent in the past couple years. If you look at the Academy Awards two years ago, all of a sudden there's this huge influx of little films because they were well directed, well acted and well written. These larger movies don't always do well.

Mary: With 'Practical Magic,' you have a great cast. With STOCKARD CHANNING and DIANNE WIEST, you have two of the finest character actresses today. You must have had an awful lot of fun.

Sandra: It was a little wicked. I think if you put three women into a room, there's bound to be extreme chaos. It gonna be volatile, and it's gonna be fun. The fun thing about Dianne and Stockard is as it progressed, they showed their true colors. Just to hear them needle GRIFFIN [DUNNE] all the time. We were going to get up on the island of Washington with him and all us women and we were like, "Just wait 'til we get to the island." He started wigging out. And then a little hell broke loose. We were a little tame until we did the tequila drinking scene.

Mary: Which is very funny.

Sandra: We decided when we had to shoot more of that scene to actually drink the tequila. Dianne kept saying she was going to challenge me to a tequila face-off. I kept saying, "Yeah, we'll do it. Whatever." I had the tequila in the fridge and never brought it out but it was Nicole who remembered to bring it. We tied one on so heavily. Griffin would come out every five seconds to do another shot and the crew would be taking shots. It was a wide shot so it was okay. We didn't do it when we were supposed to be stinking drunk which was frustrating. We did it on the wide shot of the drinking scene and had a wicked good time.

Mary: Nicole claims that she's the best drinker of the group.

Sandra: You know what? I'd probably have to give that to her. Though, I'd have to say Dianne might be able to throw some shots back. She's got that innocent thing where you think with that voice and that demeanor she's so angelic, but I think she could drink us all under the table.

Mary: But nobody swallowed the worm that night.

Sandra: I'm not going to drink a bottle of tequila with some sort of varmit at the bottom.

Mary: Why did you decide to leave Hollywood for a while and go to Austin and build a house?

Sandra: It wasn't such a conscious decision. Two or three years ago I finally spent some time in L.A., cause I'm in New York or shooting some place, and I realized that I was starting to change and I didn't want what I did for a living to change how I lived my life. I didn't want to think that every time I came home from work I was still in the place where I worked. I couldn't get away. People do very well with that and I don't. I was looking for different places where I could be very creative and open-minded and fun. I needed grass. I'm talking about the grass on the lawn not the other type (laughs). I was thinking New Orleans, but two years ago I landed on a great place which was everything that I had in my head and was everything that I wanted for myself. In the balance between there and New York, I feel I have everything.

Mary: In doing this movie with NICOLE [KIDMAN], were her kids on set?

Sandra: Yeah.

Mary: Does it make you think that you're getting closer to that time in your life?

Sandra:I've had that since I was seventeen. It's not like I have Big Ben going off at this point. I feel that people, especially in our business, rush off and get married and have kids and then haven't gotten all the selfish things out of their system that they are entitled to experience. There's a certain amount of your life where you are supposed to date and get into trouble and go through a gamut of guys and experience them and learn what you can accept and not accept. That's what I'm doing and having a good time. When it comes to that time, when I've found an amazing "other half" -- that's when the offspring will come I'm sure!

Mary: One of the themes of this movie is that love is so allusive, difficult to find.

Sandra: There's two sides to it. It's difficult when you're out searching for it because you're not approaching it for the right reasons. I think you're just looking for someone to glom onto. I think once you find a comfortable place with who you are and they've gone through all the experiences and the heartbreak that make you who you are, then it will happen the right way. If you rush it too fast, you miss out on a lot. I think this film is saying, be who you are, be comfortable with who you are. As soon as you are, that person will come who will mirror that and be able to appreciate that about you.

Mary: Do you think that ultimately you will settle down and marry someone in the business?

Sandra: I have no idea. I used to have expectations but I don't have any. None, whatsoever. I am so lucky in that department-- lucky in love.

Mary: Wait, a year and a half ago you said you were so unlucky.

Sandra: I never said I was unlucky. I just said I wasn't dating anyone. Doesn't mean I'm unlucky. It means I'm exactly what I want to be. The thing is that I've been so blessed. I would do everything the same way I've done it before. I'm really looking forward to the time when I will go to the next level. I'm having a good time.

Mary: The rumors persist about you and MATTHEW [McCONAUGHEY].

Sandra: No. We are not an item. We love each other very much, but we are not an item. The great thing is that sometimes you meet people in life who are your partners and it doesn't mean it has to be in a relationship. He's an amazing guy.

Mary: Are you in a relationship that you're enjoying right now?

Sandra: No, I'm not.

Mary: You do seem to be working on films whether acting or producing back to back.

Sandra: But this time, the one that I'm producing - I have a small part in it - but I'm home. I go home at the end of the day. I'm not traveling. I just need to be in one place for a good amount of time. I'm tired of always being on camera. I've had amazing experiences and it ended on an incredible note with the last thing that I did and I said, "You know what? It was a good exclamation point." If I have something else later on, I'll step back in front of the camera, but there are other people who are so talented and deserving of what I was given that I'd rather sit back and be responsible for them getting that. It's a lot more satisfying and there's a lot more in life that I want to do.