By Brandis Ohlsson
Just as inevitable as a models dating rock stars, models will eventually tire of the catwalks and branch out into other careers. A career path often attempted but rarely succeeded at? The infamous model turned actress. Cindy Crawford, Kate Upton, and Tyra Banks are all examples of very famous models who when made the jump to the big screen, turned out to be better mannequins than thespians. Milla Jovovich, Rebecca Romijn, and Brooke Shields, however, turned out to be not so bad at the whole acting gig and have managed to cultivate accomplished acting careers.
2015 brings us director George Miller’s Mad Max: Furry Road, a bit of a movie remake, and with it, another slew of models hoping to join the ranks of their model peers Jovovich, Romijn, and Shields and be taken seriously as actresses.
Rosie Huntington-Whitely, who sits on models.com Money Girls list and holds a cover for basically any and every fashion magazine known to fashionistas makes her major big screen acting debut as the leader of the sister wives in the Mad Max remake, going by the name The Splendid Angharad.
Courtney Eaton is a 19-year-old model from Bunberry Australia, which sits very near and on the same coast as Perth, aka land of the most beautiful people on the entire planet. On the Mad Max screen, she goes by Cheedo the Fragile. When not working on becoming a major screen siren, Courtney is signed by model agency powerhouse Vivien’s Model Management.
Abbey Lee Kershaw, high fashion’s cool girl, joins Huntington-Whitely on models.com’s Money Girls list, but also sits upon the Industry Icon’s list. Obviously well known as a model, when interviewed by Marie Claire about her acting turn, Kershaw explained, “No one knows who the fuck I am.” If Mad Max does as good as well as it’s expected to, that may soon change.
Abbey Lee out acted over a thousand girls to earn herself a role in the George Miller flick. Aside from fellow models Whitely and Eaton, Kershaw shares the screen with Zoë Kravitz and Riley Keough, who both have had some fashion moments themselves. Zoë, the daughter of music legend Lenny Kravitz, moonlights as a model for Women Management and has fronted a T by Alexander Wang campaign, and Keogh, the granddaughter of the King himself -Elvis Presley – is on the board at DNA and has been cast in campaigns for Lee Jeans and Mango.
You can’t talk about Mad Max: Fury Road without mentioning the movie’s leading actors, Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy, who, by the way, both got their start as, you guessed it … models.
Of acting, Abbey Lee has said “This is a true passion, so I’m not going to take it lightly,” and “I want to be challenged, and with that comes being selective about the things I go for.” With drive like that, these ladies are sure to be able to jump the shark to become Hollywood forces to be reckoned with.
