WATCHMEN Movie Star Malin Akerman Explains Why Playing Silk Spectre Was A Struggle For Her

WATCHMEN Movie Star Malin Akerman Explains Why Playing Silk Spectre Was A Struggle For Her

Malin Akerman played Silk Spectre in Watchmen, and the actress has now explained why playing that character was a struggle for her at a time when she starred in her first major blockbuster movie...

By JoshWilding - May 07, 2020 05:05 AM EST
Filed Under: Watchmen
Source: Collider

The Watchmen TV series has been a huge hit, and while the movie which preceded it wasn't to everyone's liking, it certainly put Zack Snyder on the map in a big way. It also boasted an impressive cast, including then relative unknown Malin Akerman. Before being cast as Silk Spectre, she was mostly known for comedies, and Watchmen marked her first major blockbuster. 

During a recent interview with Collider, the Billions star confessed that Watchmen was a struggle for her because she found herself starring opposite a number of much bigger name stars. 

"I will say that Watchmen was a big shift because I felt way out of my league on that one," Akerman explains. "I really struggled because it was such a big film and I really felt like I had no idea what I was doing. I had no training and I was working with these fabulous theater actors who had all the training in the world. I definitely didn’t feel worthy of being there."

"I felt like I had tricked them into casting me," she continued. "You know, there was a lot of stuff that I was going through, so it was definitely a shift and I just said, ‘Alright, I can’t just follow now anymore. I have to start making decisions of what it is that I want to learn, what direction I want to go in, what do I like creatively, what do I find fun? I want to put my best foot forward."

Akerman certainly made a lasting impact as Silk Spectre, and she's done well in the years which have followed. We haven't, however, seen her in many blockbusters, though she did appear in Rampage.

What did you guys make of her take on Silk Spectre?

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bkmeijer2
bkmeijer2 - 5/7/2020, 5:55 AM
I really thought this was gonna be about that weird latex outfit she had to wear all the time. Guess it wasn't just that.

And she was in Rampage? I don't remember her at all in that. Then again, I don't really remember anything about that movie.
rebellion
rebellion - 5/7/2020, 5:58 AM
She did ok, wasnt nearly as bad as ozymandias.
And she was pretty damn good in Billions.
connorblaze
connorblaze - 5/7/2020, 6:03 AM
It’s weird because I’ve loved him in everything else I’ve seen him in, but I didn’t like Patrick Wilson in Watchmen. Something about his acting made his character very annoying to me. Maybe it was by design, aince he’s kind of a whingey wussy character. I don’t know. Ackerman was alright though. Jeffrey DM was the standout by far though.
DalekCraigWasson
DalekCraigWasson - 5/7/2020, 6:12 AM
@connorblaze - I had the opposite problem with Wilson. Dan in the comic is a pudgy, depressed slob but Wilson is so handsome that he came across as the male version of the late 90s teen flick nerd girl "and then she takes off her glasses and lets down her ponytail and she's gorgeous!" trope.
Doomsday8888
Doomsday8888 - 5/7/2020, 6:04 AM
She was fine but not gonna lie...i love that she's so humble.
OmegaDaGrodd
OmegaDaGrodd - 5/7/2020, 6:26 AM
She was the worst part of Watchmen for me. I know a lot of people's complaints with that were down to fidelity to the source material (or misinterpretation of it) but I loved Watchmen whenever a scene wasn't relying on her (or Nite Owl, who was almost equally as poorly acted)
Franshu
Franshu - 5/7/2020, 6:45 AM
@OmegaDaGrodd - Agreed. Silk Spectre, Nite Owl and Ozymandias were painful to watch. Dr Manhattan, Comedian and Rorschach, on the other hand...
tmp3
tmp3 - 5/7/2020, 6:46 AM
She was incredibly mis-cast in this film. Laurie's story in the comic is so poignant and tragic, but in the movie it's incredibly cold. Don't know how much of that is Snyder's allergy for humanity in his movie and how much is her lack of experience.
Billy Crudop was fantastic casting though.
Highflyer
Highflyer - 5/7/2020, 6:56 AM
@tmp3 - "allergy for humanity" what do you mean?
JohnCastillo
JohnCastillo - 5/7/2020, 7:38 AM
Damn I had no idea people hated Wilson's Nite Owl and Ozymandias so much from the film, I thought they were fine, definitely not performances that annoyed me or pissed me off or even hated, bit of an exaggeration from people i've been reading on here.
MUTO123
MUTO123 - 5/7/2020, 11:07 AM
@JohnCastillo - I liked Patrick Wilson, but I didn’t really care for the guy playing Ozymandias. He just came off as wooden.
GeneralZod
GeneralZod - 5/7/2020, 7:56 AM
She was great in Harold & Kumar/White Castle.



But Freakshow stole the film.


Spock0Clock
Spock0Clock - 5/7/2020, 8:20 AM
Every time I hear or see any actor talk about Snyder, it seems like he's relatively unavailable to them for guidance. Some actors like that, because it means they can follow their own whims, but if you've got an actor feeling like this, they could use some reassurance and... well, direction.

George Lucas indifferently dangling his entire cast on blue screens is still maybe the worst example I've seen of it, but Snyder just seems so determined to get the physical arrangement of a shot that he's not really considering the emotional state of the human beings on camera (or how that translates to the audience). And he ends up with an end product where a lot of actors seem to lurch from deer-in-headlights to big goofy Shatnerean outbursts.
Highflyer
Highflyer - 5/7/2020, 8:51 AM
@Spock0Clock - The thing about reassurance is its hard to offer if the person is convincing enough to make you believe they don't need it. I remember listening to Amy Adams talk about Zack and how he really wanted to feel and see her emotions when she said initially was approaching it from an "internal" way.

Curious though, with the exception of Malin Akerman, what other actors gave you that impression?
Spock0Clock
Spock0Clock - 5/7/2020, 11:29 AM
@Highflyer - Well, just as an example, you see Gadot under Jenkins and she's magnetic, whereas you see her when Snyder is directing and it's just...



I can't speak to every piece of BTS info, of course since I haven't read it all. But you also look at Adams who is a truly phenomenal performer, but she mostly bumbles along these movies (though it's impossible to know what blame goes to the script and what to direction).
Highflyer
Highflyer - 5/7/2020, 11:49 AM
@Spock0Clock - I would argue that body shots that could be considered as ways to show sex appeal in comic book movies very common, Thor, Captain America, Superman. Even under Jenkins. She literally had a shot of a butt naked Trevor holding his crotch with one hand.
Spock0Clock
Spock0Clock - 5/7/2020, 1:38 PM
@Highflyer - I'm not talking about the male gaze aspect of it, I'm saying that Diana in Snyder's construction doesn't seem to have a lot going on as a character. She'cryptic, physical, and looks good. And Gadot (as a charismatic person, but not a particularly strong performer) basically modeled her way through his movies because (I'm assuming) that's where she felt comfortable.

An "actor's director" could have drawn something else out of her (as Jenkins did). You asked what makes someone an actor's director above, Jenkins definitely seems to be one, and the quality upgrade of Gadot's performance demonstrates the value of it.
marvel72
marvel72 - 5/7/2020, 9:29 AM
She was good as the Silk Spectre, so f*ckable.

Watchmen Ultimate Cut and Joker are my two favourite DC movies.
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