Hey everyone! While Comic-Con@Home concluded yesterday, I have a surprise bonus post about one more panel I attended over the weekend. That panel was Charlize Theron: Evolution of a Badass- An Action Hero Career Retrospective. Moderated by IGN’s Terri Schwartz, actress Charlize Theron discusses her past action roles and the evolution of the modern female action hero. As she is one of my favorite actresses, it was a no brainer for me to check it out and it did not disappoint!
Charlize started the panel by saying she doesn’t remember a specific moment where she got into action roles, but noted that she grew up in a household where her mother loved Chuck Norris and Charles Bronson movies and her father was a big fan of Mad Max (more on that later!). So she grew up in that action mindset, but Charlize explained how there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for women thirty years ago to take on action roles. She said that a big moment for her was seeing Sigourney Weaver as Ripley in the Alien franchise and that it changed her forever because the character felt so real to her, which later inspired her for some of her own roles.
Charlize touched on her early experiences in Hollywood as well, and how it was harder for her being a woman in the industry, especially in the action genre. When she worked on the movie The Italian Job (2003), she was insulted to find out that she was scheduled for six more weeks of car training for the stunts than her male counterparts. She said she was insulted by what she called an unfair process, and it was in part of the common misconception about women in action movies. However, Theron said that this “lit a fire under her ass” and she was determined to outdrive all of the men, which she did. She even mentions how she remembers costar Mark Wahlberg throwing up from doing 360’s with the cars on set. She noted that working on that movie was a great experience in the sense that it proved that she could hold her own in an action movie and showed her that women are unfairly thought of and cheated in the genre. Luckily for us, Theron’s career as an action star was just getting started. But for her, the opportunity to be in action films as a lead didn’t really arise until after she won an Oscar for Monster (2003) a short time later.
That first movie was Aeon Flux (2005), which did not play well with audiences or critics. After the harsh reception, Theron thought she would not get the opportunity to star in action movies again. Luckily that did not turn out to be the case for her! She explained that working on Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) really changed the trajectory for her. The film was a massive hit critically and commercially, winning six Oscars and grossing over $375 million at the box office. Theron talked a lot about how her character of Furiosa is one of the most important characters she has ever played, and that she is very proud of the character. When she first read the script, she knew how special Furiosa was and pushed hard to play her. She also dives into how the shoot itself was a tremendous feat, given that it was extremely difficult due to the physicality of the role and how everything came from a real place.
Another movie Charlize touched on was Atomic Blonde (2017). She said that this movie was very important to her because it was the first time in her career that she developed something from the ground up. She was sent eight pages of an unpublished graphic novel for the story and decided to move forward with it. Theron noted that there was a sad feeling for her about getting everything right because she was always worried that she would not get another opportunity as a female actress and producer. This led to her being under a lot of pressure for the movie, even handpicking director David Leitch because she knew he could handle that kind of pressure. A lot of the action was achieved through seven to ten minute sequences continuously, which required extra work that Theron and the crew had to pull off. She says that what she is most proud of from that movie was showing that women can fight just as hard as men. Suffice to say, the movie was a hit and a sequel is reportedly in development.
Theron also talked about her latest film The Old Guard (2020) as well. The film has become one of Netflix’s most successful originals in the service’s history reaching millions of households. She talked about how she had to learn different skills and fighting styles to portray a character that was over a millennia old. Charlize talked about the importance of raising the physical bar and staging complex action sequences while keeping an emotional story. She noted that the emotional connection is more important than the action because if there’s no emotional connection, it's hard for her to be invested in the material.
This led Charlize to talking about how the importance of women in action movies and how it has evolved over time. She said she is constantly inspired by what other women are doing in the industry, mentioning director Patty Jenkins’ (whom she worked with on Monster) effect on the superhero genre directing Wonder Woman (2017). Theron said she feels a sense of community as they all back each other up and put pressure on the industry to change the way for women. She wants her two young daughters to grow up feeling like it isn’t weird that females have equal representation as men do. I think this is where Theron shines, she truly truly cares about making a difference and hoping to inspire other actresses, just as Sigourney Weaver did for her all those years ago.
This panel gets a strong recommendation from me if you’re a fan of Charlize Theron or strong female heroes in general. She speaks with such experience and you can tell that she’s far from done, and if you’ve seen any of her movies you’ll know that’s the case. Check out the panel on Comic-Con International’s YouTube channel, and this officially brings me to the end of my first Comic-Con experience (for real this time!). What is your favorite Charlize Theron movie and/or role? Let me know in the comments!
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