Martin Scorsese’s Wall Street biopic about the rise and fall of one Jordan Belfort brought Australian actress Margot Robbie to the forefront of Hollywood and gave her a platform to stand on. Merely 22 years old at the time, the actress barely had an inkling of the reaches of the industry and the role she would go on to play in the next decade. Now 32, she looks back at the fascinating 10 years of her career and its strongly-characterized and indomitable filmography that has made her an A-lister and how it all started with a role that sent her insecurity soaring.
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Margot Robbie’s Launch & Rise via The Wolf of Wall Street
The Wolf of Wall Street was an experience that a Martin Scorsese film usually did not deliver to its audience. Devoid of mob bosses, street shootings, and dingy ’60s-themed cigar parlors, the 2013 film takes a stroll down the road of bacchanalia and an excessive dive into humanity’s basest acts when left unchecked by ambition and money. The American capitalist ideal was fulfilled to the point of overflow in the Scorsese epic led by the ever-charming Leonardo DiCaprio and a new debutante, Margot Robbie.
The 22-year-old actress at the time was new to the frontier of Hollywood and although a household name in her home continent of Australia, the Suicide Squad star did not find comfort in the scale of grandeur that came with starring in a Leo DiCaprio film. The Wolf of Wall Street established the tone of vice and immorality in its earliest shots but Robbie’s role as the arm-candy trophy wife of Leo DiCaprio’s Jordan Belfort came with its fair share of challenges.
As she later went on to reveal, the now coveted actress soon realized the necessity of her making a durable impression in the film that would define her future in the industry and earn her bread-and-butter for the rest of Robbie’s career.
Margot Robbie Recalls Filming Beside Leonardo DiCaprio
Throughout the years since The Wolf of Wall Street debut, Margot Robbie had claimed how insecurity and a wish to quit acting continued to plague her until she received a reality check from her own mother. In an interview with the Daily Mirror, Robbie revealed,
“Honestly, I know it sounds silly now, knowing how big the movie became, at the time I thought, ‘No one is going to notice me in this film. It kind of doesn’t matter what I do in this film because everyone is going to be focused on Leo [DiCaprio] and everything.’”
Earlier at a BAFTA event, the Babylon star also claimed, “I’m not going to lie, I had a couple of shots of tequila before that scene because I was nervous… very, very nervous,” referencing the infamous nude scene that featured her opposite Leo DiCaprio. When voicing her wish to quit her career to her mother, the conversation quickly led to Robbie realizing that that was not an option.
“And I remember saying to my mom, ‘I don’t think I want to do this,’ and she just looked at me, completely straight-faced, and was like, ‘Darling, I think it’s too late not to.’ That’s when I realized the only way was forward.”
Margot Robbie now boasts of a diverse filmography that usually demands her presence in a leading role. The actress has appeared in the DCU as the infamous Harley Quinn in two Suicide Squad films and has helmed her own superhero banner in Birds of Prey. Her latest release Amsterdam received middling reviews and the audience awaits the launch of Damien Chazelle’s Babylon.
The Wolf of Wall Street is available for streaming on Paramount+ and Prime Video.
Source: Daily Mirror
