How Margot Robbie became one of Hollywood’s most powerful actresses

By Violaine Schütz.

Published on 8 October 2025. Updated on 9 February 2026.

If she was not an actress, Margot Robbie would have become a stuntperson or a trapeze artist. And from what we can say about her career, she can turn the tables around quite fast. Besides her glamorous appearance in Barbie — the fictional creature she embodied on the big screen in 2023, a movie signed Greta Gerwig — the 35-year-old Australian star could have been held back to superficial, bombshells or romantic interest roles.

We are well-aware of Hollywood’s tendency to hold back women in main roles — especially beautiful ones. Marilyn Monroe faced years of being restrained to the archetype of the dumb blonde before finding interesting roles.

The sensational rise of Margot Robbie

Despite common misogynistic beliefs, Margot Robbie has way more to give than her physical appearance. And she won’t let herself be restrained to a cliché. Born at Dalby in Queensland (in Australia), she didn’t grow up around people from the industry. As a child, the Australian actress was raised by a single mother, a physiotherapist, with two brothers and a sister.

She became more assertive, or rebellious, during her teenage years, accumulating hours of detention and spending most of her time at her grandparents’ ranch. At 15 years old, something clicked. She watched a girl on the TV screen, the same age as her, playing a mediocre performance, according to the future actress. This judgmental assessment led Margot Robbie to the acting path, aspiring to become a wealthy and talented actress.

A common thread between Margot Robbie and Kylie Minogue

Yet, it would take her many eclectic experiences before she became one of the most profitable stars in the City of Angels. After graduating from high school in the coastal city Gold Coast known for its long sandy beaches and idyllic surfing spots – a sport that the actress loves as much as ice hockey and Pilates – Margot Robbie began studying law, but quickly dropped out of college.

This was followed by a series of odd jobs, which proved that the future artist was not afraid to roll up her sleeves. The Australian used to work in a surf shop, in a grocery shop, in a pharmacy, at Subway, as a babysitter and as a cleaner.

At the age of 17, the music metal and True Romance fan finally decided to take a step towards the career of her dreams and moved to Melbourne to have a better chance at castings. Helped by her spectacular features, Margot Robbie landed several roles in 2008, both in films and in shows, such as the soap opera Neighbours, the show that marked Kylie Minogue’s debut.

She owes much of this Hollywood foray to her guts. The aspiring actress had written to the soap’s producers asking them to hire her. An attitude that would become her trademark – later, she would write to Quentin Tarantino… Her philosophy? If she wants something, she does everything she can to get it as quickly as possible. Because Margot Robbie hates to wait…

A memorable slap given to Leonardo DiCaprio

However, it wasn’t until 2013 that things truly turned around for Margot Robbie. Still relatively unknown in the industry at that time, her career shifted under Martin Scorsese‘s direction of Wolf of Wall Street (2013). She played the alluring spouse of a wealthy broker, played by Leonardo DiCaprio. The movie drew three millions moviegoers in France. Beneath the dazzling, dirty pink wardrobe, the role revealed the character’s manipulative and calculative side.

To land this coveted role, Margot Robbie took a huge risk. She slapped Leonardo DiCaprio during the audition process, thus making an impression on both the actor and the director thanks to her boldness. Scorsese described her as a blend of three great actresses – Ida Lupino for her “emotional audacity”, Carole Lombard for her comic talent, and Joan Crawford for her tenacity.

That convincing performance became her free pass to the most sought-after roles. Margot Robbie has made one appearance after another, always sharing her magnetic, intense, fiery aura, filled with fury, humour, and madness. She is 100% committed to her roles and often returns home shaking, having trouble sleeping after her performances.

From I, Tonya to Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood

Margot Robbie plays with the same intensity a glamorous con artist in Diversion (2015), alongside Will Smith, the dangerous, zany, punk, Harlequin-suited anti-heroine Harley Quinn in Suicide Squad (2016), and the deranged figure skater Tonya Harding in the dark comedy I, Tonya (2017).

This last tortured and grandiose performance remains the best of her career so far and earned her her first Best Actress Oscar nomination. As a Fight Club (1999) and action movie fan, Margot Robbie feels drawn to provocative films and to roles of strong women, such as Queen Elizabeth I in Mary Queen of Scots (2018), the ill-fated actress Sharon Tate in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), or the vengeful journalist in the thriller Bombshell (2019), alongside Charlize Theron and Nicole Kidman. Every time she appears on the big screen, the same feeling arises.

Margot Robbie impresses audiences with her accuracy, elegance, and commitment in every shot. She can be sensual, dark, and hilarious, in one single scene. Her ultimate strength? Her mysterious blue eyes, coupled with her ability to “get ugly” for a role, and to be willing to play the villain or the psychopath, thus breaking the image of the Australian surfer with the ultra-bright smile that could have stuck to her skin.

“I started making a lot of art. Making art at home during lockdown soon started to feel weird.” – Margot Robbie

in October 2022, the actress revealed another side of herself. In the movie Amsterdam (2022), directed by David O. Russell (American Bluff, Happiness Therapy), starring Christian Bale, Rami Malek, and Robert De Niro, she plays a whimsical brunette nurse named Valerie, who makes a friendship pact with two veterans during the First World War – her lover, who is a lawyer, and a doctor. The three of them live the best years of their life in Amsterdam before a fascist rise threatens the US government. Valerie is a dreamy, funny young woman, who makes artistic objects with the metal of the bullets she collected from the bodies of the soldiers she treats.

She also likes to take photos of her surroundings to create original pictures. “I had a lot of time to prep for the role of Valerie. Longer than I have ever had for any other role. Not only because David, the director, was so collaborative that he wanted to talk about Valerie and about the film years before we did it, but also because we had to stop everything at one point because of Covid. Perhaps, the preparation time was a bit too long, to be honest. I started doing a lot of art at home during lockdown. It was getting weird at some point.”

Amsterdam: A larger-than-life story about love and friendship

Known for throwing herself into her roles, Margot Robbie was taken in by Valerie’s creative and “crazy” personality right from the start, as the actress puts it. She explains: “I fell in love with Valerie. She follows her own rhythm. At one point, my husband came into the room I was in, and there were pieces of metal and fake blood everywhere. I had my Super 8 camera out, I was wearing a mask, and I had all this crazy stuff like X-rays around me. (Laughs) He then told me: ‘I think you’re pushing this character a little too far. You need to calm down.’ And I simply replied: ‘Okay then.’”

Part of the reason why the actress didn’t have any trouble doing a brilliant portrayal of her character was that, strangely enough, she had been on a similar journey herself. “The pact of friendship Valerie makes with Harold and Burt means everything to her. And it happens that I was also part of a very similar symbiotic trio to the one in the film. Ironically, we all met in Europe too, in Belgium to be exact. That’s where I met my two best friends. I have married one of them, while I’m working with the other one. I let parts of myself infuse this film and I think that this authenticity shows on screen.”

Major productions including Babylon and Barbie

As a matter of fact, Margot Robbie met assistant directors Tom Ackerley (now her husband and father of her child) and Josey McNamara (now her friend) in 2014 on the set of the French- British-Belgian film Suite Française (2015). The three founded a British production company, LuckyCharp Entertainments, as Margot Robbie lives between London and Los Angeles. This production company aims to bring great women’s stories to the screen and support women creators behind the scenes. Suite Française featured actor Matthias Schoenaerts, who also stars in Amsterdam. Proof that happy coincidences and magic are never far away when Margot Robbie is part of a project.

However, it may only be the beginning of the actress’ consecration, who admits to continuously be afraid that the climax of her career might be behind her. Today, the Australian star is the highest paid actress in Hollywood. In 2023, she starred in Damien Chazelle’s anticipated feature Babylon (2023), alongside Brad Pitt. She apparently insisted to kiss him in one specific scene, even though it wasn’t part of the script. She also appeared next to Tom Hanks, Tilda Swinton, Adrien Brody, and Scarlett Johansson in Wes Anderson’s upcoming film Asteroid City (2023).

But above all, she shone as the iconic Mattel doll in Barbie , directed by Greta Gerwig and co-starring Ryan Gosling. The film that made waves upon its theatrical release in July 2023. Co-produced by Margot Robbie’s company, LuckyChap Entertainment, the movie explores the ultra-pink universe of the gendered toy with a feminist, offbeat, and critical twist.

The lead in Wuthering Heights

And that’s not all… After taking a break in 2024 to welcome her first child, the star is back in full swing with multiple projects. She’s set to produce films based on The Sims and the board game Monopoly. The new face of Chanel No. 5 also stars in A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, alongside Colin Farrell. Released in October 2025, this dreamy, original romcom tells the story of two single people reliving key moments from their respective lives.

On February 11th, 2026, Margot Robbie will be seen in the anticipated, romantic film Wuthering Heights by Emerald Fennell. This bold and very sexual film adaptation of Emily Brontë’s novel Wuthering Heights also stars Jacob Elordi. The actress plays the capricious, passionate and fascinating Catherine Earnshaw. At a Paris press conference, the star spoke about her meticulous preparation for the role. “I don’t know how to avoid seeming strange or quirky, but I associate colours with different emotions. I find it helpful to put colours on my scripts. That was the case for Cathy. I do different things for each character, and every film has its own requirements. For some roles, I write down dreams and memories in a diary… But a long paragraph didn’t feel right for Cathy.”

The actress, who embarked on a phenomenal fashion marathon to promote her new film, added: “I don’t think she would have had the patience to read all that. She’s a bit more direct. But I did still colour-code the script. When she’s ill, the colours fade and turn pastel. When she’s with her husband, Edgar, it’s pink-red, and when she’s with Heathcliff (played by Jacob Elordi, ed), it’s brown. In Wuthering Heights, the whole rainbow comes into play.”

Once again, the fearless actress takes on a major role that propels her even further on the road to stardom and becomes one of the most influential women in Hollywood. All the more so given that she is producing the project as well.

Wuthering Heights by Emerald Fennell, coming out in theatres on February 11th, 2026.