Thandie Newton has received widespread critical acclaim for her work in HBO's Westworld, but the actress has revealed in an interview with Vulture that she passed on a major blockbuster early in her career.
That was 2000's Charlie's Angels, which ended up starring Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, and Lucy Liu, and the 30-year acting veteran wasn't on board with the way women were portayed.
"One of the biggest movies I didn't end up doing was because the director said to me, 'I can't wait for this. The first shot is going to be...You're going to think it's like yellow lines down a road, and you pull back and you realize it's the stitching, because the denim is so tight on your ass it's going to look like tarmac.' I was like, 'Oh, I don't think we're going to go down this road together.'"
McG directed Charlie's Angels, so that's more than likely who Newton is referencing here. Unfortunately, she didn't find much in the way of support from those at Sony Pictures, either.
"I had a meeting with [the head of the studio]," Newton recalls. "And she said, 'Look, I don't mean to be politically incorrect, but the character as written and you playing the role, I just feel like we've got to make sure that it's believable.' She's basically reeling off these stereotypes of how to be more convincing as a Black character."
"Everything she said, I was like, 'Nah, I wouldn't do that.' She’s like, 'Yeah, but you're different. You're different.' That was Amy Pascal. That’s not really a surprise, let’s face it: I didn’t do the movie as a result."
If Pascal's name rings a bell, it's because she's now one of the producers on the Spider-Man family of movies, and her attitude towards race definitely comes as a surprise.
Sony Pictures rebooted Charlie's Angels last year, but it bombed at the box office.
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