Of all the attributes that make a movie star, storytelling is among the least appreciated. It takes good looks, good luck, persistence and charisma, but without a myth, an actor is just an actor. To become a star, she must create and nourish what a Hollywood scriptwriter would call a narrative arc or, worse, a journey, and that requires the ability to tell well-worn anecdotes as if they're fresh. The more revealing a story seems, the better it is crafted.
There are plenty of reasons to believe Margot Robbie will be Australia's next A-list export – just look at that face – but the clincher may be that she is a world champion raconteur, with a gift for describing scenes for the first time every time, as if she's giving you a little piece of herself.
To promote her new film, Focus, she has a cracker lined up. It begins on an island off the coast of Croatia, at dawn, after a night of clubbing, and ends with her winning the starring role in New York the next day. Robbie is walking on the beach, carefree, when her agent calls. One catamaran ride and two flights later, she is scouring the racks at Top Shop on Broadway, wondering what to wear for Will Smith.
"I got to New York in the nick of time. I had had eight hours' sleep in 50-something hours," she says. So after cursing the airline for losing her luggage, she bought a white shirt, had a shower and auditioned in ripped denim shorts encrusted with salt from the Adriatic Sea. Smith was won over. "We had a rapport immediately," Robbie says. "And chemistry. When it works, it works."
Early last year, after her breakthrough in The Wolf of Wall Street as the wife of Leonardo DiCaprio's character, Jordan Belfort, Robbie told style magazine Violet Grey that "you become an actor and all of a sudden everyone wants to know about you. But I didn't become an actor so I could show you me. I became an actor so I can show you characters and never have to show you me."
Perhaps I'm reading too much into it, but that line struck me as more revealing than any supposedly candid anecdote, so when we meet, I ask her about it. "I'm pretty open and when I do interviews I end up blabbing," she says.
I think: "The lady doth protest too much."
This is not to accuse her of being cynical, or dishonest – I'm sure she's great company and she seems to be a genuinely nice person – but merely to observe that every aspect of her career has been managed with meticulous attention to detail. Why should her public persona be any different?
When she was 18, not long after landing the part of Donna Freeman in Neighbours, Robbie told the student magazine S-Press "I've got big, big dreams for the future. I want to go to LA and be a massive actor over there." Her last two years on Ramsay Street were spent making sure it happened. She perfected her British and American accents with a dialect coach, hired a top-flight agent and manager and saved enough money to live on for a couple of years if she couldn't find work.
"Everyone knew that I was going," she says. "Some people said, 'You're going to be fine over there',' but others were like, 'All right, we'll see you soon', like it won't work out."
Five days after her contract ended, she was on a plane. Within a month, she had won a major role in Pan Am, a prime-time television series about the golden age of air travel.
Pan Am was cancelled after one season, but it was fun while it lasted. The show had a softball team that competed against other programs in a league. Robbie, the only actor in a team of crew members, was also "self-appointed" captain and face-painter. "We were undefeated. Even if we were winning, I'd still give them the inspirational speech," she says. Her competitive streak, forged on the fields of Dalby, three hours inland from Brisbane, has served her well.
She got the part of Naomi Lapaglia in The Wolf of Wall Street by slapping DiCaprio in an argument scene at the audition. Understanding that her character was more than a gold -digger in short skirts, acrylic nails and killer heels helped her turn in a memorable performance as the wounded wife, fighting for the attention of a husband addicted to sex, drugs and money.
Until preparing for the interview, this was the only Margot Robbie I knew, so it was a shock to see how wholesome she looked at the altar in Neighbours, telling Ringo: "It's like a dream. I choose you." From there to "Mommy is just so sick and tired of wearing panties" is quite a trip, especially when seen in reverse order.
On Jimmy Kimmel's late-night chat show, Robbie made much of how people in Dalby would be shocked by the film. She had lied to her family about the nude scenes, she said. "I'm gonna follow it up with a movie that's a little more pleasing to a country town," she suggested. "Everything after this is a Disney film by comparison," Kimmel replied.
It would be a shame if that turns out to be true. Robbie has made two potential blockbusters, due for release this year. She's Jane in the latest movie adaptation of Tarzan, opposite Alexander Skarsgard – "He's naked the whole film. Firsthand, ladies, I'm telling you, his body ... " – and in Z for Zachariah, she plays the teenage survivor of a nuclear war who may or may not be the last woman on Earth. Add in a supporting part in World War Two drama Suite Francaise, alongside Michelle Williams and Kristin Scott Thomas, and it makes for a fine third act.
But there's no career-defining role. Yet.
Focus will not be that film, although she gives a charming performance as Smith's love interest and foil. The plot is too hackneyed and the twists too predictable to create any real tension, and while it's enjoyable enough to watch a charismatic thief and his band of talented misfits pull off the perfect heist, yet again, there's not all that much for Robbie to do as an actress, except pick pockets and rock a bikini.
She clearly got on well with Smith, whom she describes as "incredibly dedicated, incredibly professional and the nicest guy ever". A leaked strip of pictures from a photo booth of the two horsing around led some gossip magazines to speculate they were getting on a little too well, a claim she scoffs at. Whatever, it was great publicity.
These days, she lives in London, with three new friends she met while filming Suite Francaise and an old pal from the Gold Coast, Soph, who works as her assistant. For all the movie-star glamour, the free clothes from Prada and Miu Miu, she makes it sound like a student flat.
"We always have people staying. You wake up and there's eight people sleeping in the living room," she says. "We woke up one morning and there were three Canadians sitting in our courtyard." Over a cup of tea, they found out their guests were just passing through, backpacking, on their way to Dublin. When they got word that Robbie wasn't needed on set for two days, they decided to join them.
At the hostel, a couple of people asked "aren't you the girl ... " but she laughed it off. "I still catch the Tube everywhere. I still go to the same pubs," she says. "I'll just keep doing it until I can't do it any more."
With her star on the rise, that may be sooner than she thinks.
Focus is released on March 5
From suds to stardom
At the Australians in Film gala in Los Angeles last October, after picking up an award for breakthrough actor of the year, Robbie thanked the cast and crew of Neighbours and reminisced about her time "doing the graduate course at Ramsay Street". Here are a few more stars who got their start in Aussie soaps.
Russell Crowe
Played Kenny Larkin in Neighbours in 1987. After ditching the mullet, he won a best actor Oscar for his role in Gladiator, and a reputation as one of the prickliest characters in Hollywood.
Guy Pearce
Won the part of Mike Young on Neighbours when he was only 18. He spent three years on the show, before creating a new image playing a drag queen in Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, at the start of a successful movie career.
Isabel Lucas
Played Tasha Andrews in Home and Away for four years. Her big break was in the second Transformers movie, playing a student who is really a Pretender Decepticon. She has since appeared in Daybreakers, Immortals, Red Dawn and Careful What You Wish For.
Chris Hemsworth✓
Before he was Thor, God of Thunder, this native of Phillip Island was lifeguard Kim Hyde in Home and Away. He also made a brief appearance in Neighbours, as Jamie Kane, working at spare car-parts shop Moco.
And let's not forget...
Other soapie alumni include Heath Ledger, Holly Valance, Isla Fisher, Naomi Watts, Radha Mitchell, Melissa George, Ryan Kwanten, Alan Dale and, of course, Kylie Minogue.
