The Brendan Fraser movie that made Margot Robbie want to be an actor
Long before Margot Robbie became Barbie, she was primed to take on a career in law. Encouraged by her parents, the Australian actor graduated from high school and studied the subject, but she quickly realised that a courtroom wasn’t her true calling. It was the audition room.
“I decided I didn’t want to spend money I didn’t have, on a subject I didn’t want to do, only to be paying back debt for the rest of my life. Why abide by that invisible rule?” she recalled to The Guardian. Instead of abiding by her parents’ advice and the safety of university, Robbie darted between jobs to fund her love of acting and travelling.
“The ultimate goal of my journey was to unpack my bags in Hollywood and stay there. But to do that you had to earn a living,” she once told Blush. Between jobs working at a surf shop, a Subway, a grocery shop, a pharmacy, and as a waitress, a cleaner, and a babysitter, the budding actor eventually fulfilled her dreams.
Between a role in Aussie soap staple Neighbours and a backpacking trip to Europe, Robbie’s decision to drop law had paid off. She eventually appeared alongside Domhnall Gleeson and Rachel McAdams in Richard Curtis’ About Time before finding her breakthrough performance opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese’s Jordan Belfort biopic, The Wolf of Wall Street.
There was one film that was particularly instrumental in Robbie’s decision to pursue film – Sam Weisman’s 1997 comedy, George of the Jungle. The actor seemed reluctant to name the film, wishing she could give a more pretentious or respected answer: “I would love to say: Hiroshima mon amour, In the Realm of the Senses or 2001: A Space Odyssey, but that’s not the case! The first film that got me interested in this business was George of the Jungle with Brendan Fraser.”
The film was based on the television series of the same name, which was inspired by Tarzan. Even Robbie herself can’t seem to explain why George of the Jungle made her want to act: “Don’t ask me why, but I loved that film. My parents didn’t see it coming. When I started expressing this desire to perform, they thought it would be a hobby. Something that wouldn’t last. As time went on, they realised that I was super-determined and that there was no way I would be twiddling my thumbs in Hollywood.”
She certainly wouldn’t be twiddling her thumbs in Hollywood. In just over 15 years since her first acting roles, Robbie has carved out a place for herself as one of the biggest names in the industry. She even had a full-circle moment when she starred in David Yates’ The Legend of Tarzan in 2016, a live-action film also based on the character of Tarzan.
