Margot Robbie names “the most unpleasant thing I’ve ever done in my entire life”
Margot Robbie is no stranger to putting her body on the line if it means nailing a movie scene. Part of her recipe for success is her full-throttle willingness to commit to the bit. It’s why Once Upon a Time in Hollywood director Quentin Tarantino once praised Robbie, calling her his “power pack of enthusiasm”.
Whether it’s sitting in hair and makeup for three hours while makeup artist Jenny Shircore painted on her chalky Queen Elizabeth I makeup for Josie Rourke’s 2018 Mary Queen of Scots, adhering to a strict five-month ice-skating schedule in order to play a convincing Tonya Harding, or falling out of a helicopter while filming for DC Comic’s 2016 Suicide Squad. It’s clear Margot Robbie is up for any challenge.
While the former experiences did little to crush the Australian actor’s spirit, there is one stunt that was so uncomfortable Robbie has dubbed it the most “unpleasant” scene of her entire career. This is coming from a woman who had to read Jordan Belfort’s memoir for The Wolf of Wall Street, so that’s saying something.
The scene in question took place while filming David Ayer’s Suicide Squad. In the movie, Robbie plays the villainous Harley Quinn, whose blue and red dip-dyed pigtails have become a staple of Halloween dressing. In order to complete Quinn’s villain origin story, we see her dive into a vat of chemicals at Arkham Asylum, egged on by The Joker himself. The pair resurface from the muck coated in a metallic, blue and red substance.
It was “the most unpleasant thing I’ve ever done in my entire life”, Robbie told The Washington Post in a 2016 interview. “So that was definitely my least favourite,” she confirms.” It was like this gluggy paint stuff that was so far in my ears and up my nose, and I was choking on it underwater, and I couldn’t breathe, and I tried to open my eyes, and it would glaze over my eyeballs, and I could only see white. It was horrible.”
It sounds horrible. Her description is a far cry from the 1920s debauchery and parties in Damien Chazelle’s Babylon or the serene pink walls of Barbie’s Dreamhouse. What’s more, the scene is visually unremarkable, meaning Robbie sacrificed herself to a pit of sludge for nothing. Suicide Squad was considered a flop by both fans and critics alike, though the reasons have little to do with Robbie’s performance.
At least the success of Suicide Squad had no impact on Robbie’s rising star. The actor has cemented herself as one of Hollywood’s brightest talents with her titular role in Greta Gerwig’s box office smash Barbie. Meanwhile, Robbie’s production company LuckyChap, which she founded with British husband Tom Ackerley, garnered around $60million for producing the film. It’s also behind some of the most talked about releases of the past few years, including Saltburn, I, Tonya and Promising Young Woman.
