100 marieclaire.com.au
Breaking big
JACKIE FRANK: Tell me about the early days.
How did you break into the industry?
RACHEL GRIFFITHS: Well, I got shot out of a
cannon, really, with Muriel’s Wedding.
My beginning in Los Angeles was really
unusual because Muriel’s Wedding was
such a phenomenon. It was my first film
and it made $60 million in the US. So I
had a real following there. Having said
that, anything I auditioned for pretty
much five years afterwards I didn’t get.
JF: When you were living in Sydney, mov-
ing to Hollywood wasn’t really something
that was on your radar, was it? You were
quoted as saying, “I get spun out in LA.I was like well, yeah, I’m not beautiful.
And now I just look back and go oh, you
stupid idiot. It was probably a chat-up
line. So it takes a while to tune in.
JF: But you’re also a bit self-effacing, and
have been very frank about where you
rank yourself in terms of looks. You’ve
said you are “good looking but not beau-
tiful”, and that having that outlook has
worked in your favour.
RG: I read this great study about women
executives. You have to be attractive,
handsome, but not so pretty that anyone
thinks you don’t have brains. I don’t
want to say I feel sorry
for really, really beauti-
ful women, but I think
it is hard to be taken
seriously if you look
like Charlize Theron.
Like, she wasn’t taken
seriously as an actress
until she did Monster.
Even I was like, God, she’s a model, how
many bloody movies are they going to
give her! And then you see Monster and
you’re like, shame on me. Because I was
totally doing the intelligent brunette/
dumb blonde [stereotyping].SPEAKING
frankly
I feel I’m not good enough and
I have to go shopping.”
RG: [Laughs] Or maybe I just
have a shopping problem and
I’m blaming LA. I don’t know,
it’s funny. As an Australian, I
always felt very at home in the
UK – it just felt like our peo-
ple. Americans are very differ-
ent to Australians and I had
to adjust. I remember I went
to this very highfalutin dinner
party, right after Muriel’s Wedding and
I was like the person of honour. And this
writer, who apparently
was like one of the top
writers on a sitcom,
said to me, “Well,
you’re doing very well
for an ugly person.”
I was devastated.
I went to the toilet and
I was trying not to cry
and it just ruined my whole night. And
now I look back and just think, he was
joking. He didn’t actually think I was
ugly. He thought I was 26 and gorgeous
and, you know, it was that American
humour. I took it literally because in LA“I think it is hard
to be taken
seriously if
you look like
Charlize Theron”