Birds Of Prey star Margot Robbie on her girl gang and why action movies aren’t just for dudes
Ahead of her big night at the Oscars, Aussie A-lister Margot Robbie reveals what really inspired the “girl gang” attitude of Harley Quinn in Birds Of Prey.
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Margot Robbie may have already created a glittering career out of playing “real” people in acclaimed dramas – and scored two Oscar nominations along the way – but screen a film packed with pyrotechnics, explosions and stunts, and she’s all in.
“I think there’s a misconception that action films are for dudes and girls don’t really like them, which isn’t true – I love them,” Robbie tells Hit. TV at a downtown New York hotel, where she’s taken up residence in a luxury suite high above the city.
“And I know a lot of women who love them, not just dudes.”
So, when Robbie wasn’t seeing the sort of female-led action films on screen that she wanted to watch with her mates on a Saturday night, she went straight to US movie studio Warner Bros and pitched one.
(Not surprisingly, it’s that sort of take control approach that has Robbie’s Oscar-winning Bombshell co-stars Charlize Theron and Nicole Kidman describing the Australian respectively as “a little intimidating”, and “a powerhouse”.)
Robbie, who founded the production company LuckyChap Entertainment with husband Tom Ackerley and two close friends in 2014, had the idea for a female-centric action flick while filming the screen adaptation of the comic book series Suicide Squad in 2015.
In that film, Robbie played the brilliant and chaotic Harley Quinn among a cast that also included Jared Leto, Will Smith, Viola Davis, Joel Kinnaman and Jai Courtney (critics and fans alike largely agreed that Robbie was the best thing in it).
Robbie loved playing Harley but couldn’t understand why she would stay with the Joker (Jared Leto) who was hellbent on killing her, so the 29-year-old Gold Coast native, who grew up loving the Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu iteration of Charlie’s Angels, saw a “gap in the market” to get a female-led superhero action film on screen.
Warner Bros, suitably impressed with Robbie’s pitch, gave her the green light.
The end result is Birds Of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation Of One Harley Quinn, which also stars Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Huntress, Jurnee Smollett-Bell as Black Canary, Rosie Perez as Renee Montoya and Chris Messina as Victor Zsasz.
It’s written by a woman (Christina Hodson), directed by a woman (Cathy Yan) and has women producers (Robbie and Sue Kroll).
“You are seeing it through a uniquely female perspective, and I think because of that, there is going to be a feeling of female empowerment,” states Robbie. “And I hope women want to stand up and cheer when they see this film, but it’s made for everyone – good stories cross gender lines – and I think the dudes will enjoy it, too.”
The film, which Robbie describes as “bold and colourful and funny and violent, and subversive and just a wild ride”.
And this time around, Leto’s Joker is nowhere to be seen.
“Harley and Mr J have split up,” laughs Robbie. “She’s emancipated!”
Instead, Robbie wanted Harley to have her own “girl gang”.
“It’s something I’ve been saying for years that in my real life I have so many groups of girlfriends that are just like my gang and I’ve rarely seen that depicted on screen and it never made sense to me.
“I wanted that sort of ensemble to be shown because I think that was something that Harley would desperately want,” Robbie muses.
“There was a lot to play with there – you could have different kind of iterations of what that group would be and, in this film, you certainly see this particular group start coming together and kicking arse.”
Right now, it’s Robbie who is kicking butt in Hollywood. On Monday, she’ll front up at the Academy Awards where she has been nominated for the second time; this time for her performance of Kayla, a news producer who is the victim of sexual harassment by Fox News boss Roger Ailes, in Bombshell. The nomination follows on from her 2017 nod as disgraced figure skater Tonya Harding in I, Tonya (which also marked LuckyChap Entertainment’s first foray into producing).
And while megastars such as Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon, Charlize Theron and Jennifer Aniston founded production companies once their careers were already long established, Robbie knew even from her days back on Neighbours that she wanted to take charge of her own career and the stories she wanted to tell.
As such, she was just 24 when LuckyChap Entertainment was founded.
“I love being on board from the very inception of a project – you feel so a part of it,” says Robbie.
“It’s a side of my brain I like to exercise and, creatively, I think it complements the work I do as an actor because I understand exactly how the project came to be and every decision that went into it.
“It kind of just helps me with the world I’m creating in my head anyway. I love doing both.”
Hollywood veteran Perez, who scored an Oscar nomination for Fearless in 1993, found herself surprised that Robbie was so down to earth and accessible while filming Birds Of Prey.
“I was having a problem with something and Jurnee [Smollett-Bell] told me to call Margot. I was like, ‘Hmm, really? No …’
“But I rang Margot and we spoke late one night for an hour and she was so great. I called Jurnee [Smollett-Bell] back and said, ‘You weren’t f---ing kidding about Margot,’” Perez laughs.
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“I’ve being in this business for a very long time and what happens sometimes is the actor-producer becomes extremely overwhelmed and you feel their stress and that becomes your stress, or their ego comes into play, so there’s a distance like, I’m the boss and I never felt that [with Margot]. Margot is cool, so take the props, doll. Of course, we’d also trash her ass.”
And with that Robbie lets out a loud cackle and goes back to her brilliant career.
Birds Of Prey is out tomorrow.