Katherine Heigl has an interview in the upcoming issue of Vanity Fair that may be just a little too critical of her employers. She called the film Knocked Up, which was generally lauded by critics and helped her make the transition from television to the big screen, “sexist.” Heigl said she had a hard time with how the women were portrayed in the film, and that the men were more likable.

Emmy-winning actress Katherine Heigl tells Vanity Fair contributing editor Leslie Bennetts that she thinks Knocked Up, the movie that catapulted her onto the A-list, is “a little sexist. It paints the women as shrews, as humorless and uptight, and it paints the men as lovable, goofy, fun-loving guys. It exaggerated the characters, and I had a hard time with it, on some days. I’m playing such a bitch; why is she being such a killjoy? Why is this how you’re portraying women? Ninety-eight percent of the time it was an amazing experience, but it was hard for me to love the movie.”

[From The Huffington Post]

I thought that Knocked Up was an incredible film. It was sort-of a guy movie, but it also had male characters that were incredibly self indulgent and lazy while the women were hardworking complainers. I didn’t think that film spared the men at all, and it would have never occurred to me to call it sexist. Sure people were exaggerated, but that’s how movies are.

Heigl also spits on her bread and butter, saying that Grey’s producers are making risky plot decisions to draw ratings. She said she doesn’t know who her character Izzy is after she starting carrying on an affair with her married coworker, and that she thinks the plot twist is just a ploy to spice things up on the show:

When Heigl’s Grey’s Anatomy character, Izzie Stevens, began an affair with her married best friend on the show this season, Heigl became concerned about her character’s seemingly uncharacteristic actions. “That was kind of a big change for Izzie, wasn’t it, after she was so up on her moral high ground. They really hurt somebody, and they didn’t seem to be taking a lot of responsibility for it. I have a really hard time with that kind of thing. I’m maybe a little too black-and-white about it. I don’t really know Izzie very well right now. She’s changed a lot. I’m trying to figure her out and keep her real.”

Heigl is well aware of the commercial considerations that often drive such decisions. “It was a ratings ploy,” she tells Bennetts. “It was absolutely something that shocked people; it wasn’t predictable, and people didn’t see it coming. It’s our fourth season; there’s not a lot of spontaneity left. And business is business; I understand that, but I want there to be some cooperation between the business end and the creative end, so there’s some way of keeping it real.”

[From The Huffington Post]

Doesn’t it seem rather risky to be dissing a movie that helped launch your tentative big screen career and a show that made you a star? Heigl makes some other good points in that same interview about how women work too hard to please others and not themselves, and aren’t outspoken enough about what they want, but I think she goes too far. You should talk smack about your employer to your friends and co-workers, not to the press.

Katherine might be being so open for another reason. Vanity Fair is known to give the cover to the celebrity who gives the most revealing interview that month. At least we’re hearing about how she’s annoyed with her job rather than how she dealt with a painful past. Maybe she thinks that her fame will eventually outweigh the negative effects of all the crap she’s talking about her job. Look at Lindsay Lohan. She got two DUIs and she’s still getting work. Being a little bitchy shouldn’t count against her, I guess.

Katherine Heigl and her fiance, Josh Kelly, are shown out getting healthy shakes on 11/30/07, thanks to Splash News.