Meryl Streep in her impersonation of characters, "subsuming herself into them, rather than personifying them". In her early roles such as "Manhattan" and "Kramer vs. Kramer", she was compared to both Diane Keaton and Jill Clayburgh, in that her characters were unsympathetic, which Streep has attributed to the tendency to be drawn to playing women who are difficult to like and lack empathy. Streep has stated that many consider her to be a technical actor, but she professed that it comes down to her love of reading the initial script, adding, "I come ready and I don't want to screw around and
Meryl Streep "open[ing] probably more doors than I probably even know about". Robert De Niro, who had spotted Streep in her stage production of "The Cherry Orchard", suggested that she play the role of his girlfriend in the war film "The Deer Hunter" (1978). Cazale, who had been diagnosed with lung cancer, was also cast in the film, and Streep took on the role of a "vague, stock girlfriend" to remain with Cazale for the duration of filming. Longworth notes that Streep: Pauline Kael, who would later become a strong critic of Streep, remarked that she was a "real beauty" who brought