Natalie Portman‘s career survived STAR WARS, but the actress wasn’t quite sure it was going to turn out that way. Portman has gone on to become one of the most acclaimed performers of her generation and has won numerous awards, including Best Actress for Darren Aronofsky‘s BLACK SWAN. Still, it came very close in her estimation to not being a happy ending and she can point fingers at George Lucas.
In a recent New York Magazine article, a section dedicated to the late Mike Nichols includes some memories from collaborators like Meryl Streep, Eric Idle, Julia Roberts, Robert Redford, and Portman. Portman’s memory specifically calls out how Nichols helped save her career right after the release of STAR WARS: EPISODE I – THE PHANTOM MENACE.
Star Wars had come out around the time of Seagull, and everyone thought I was a horrible actress. I was in the biggest-grossing movie of the decade, and no director wanted to work with me. Mike wrote a letter to Anthony Minghella and said, “Put her in Cold Mountain, I vouch for her.” And then Anthony passed me on to Tom Tykwer, who passed me on to the Wachowskis. I worked with Milos Forman a few years later. He said, “Mike saved me. He wrote a letter so that I could get asylum in the U.S.” He did that for 50 people, and it doesn’t make any one of us feel less special.
Portman and Nichols would go on to work together on the excellent CLOSER, but back in 1999 it seems that Portman felt the sting of the critical drubbing given to almost everyone associated with STAR WARS: EPISODE I – THE PHANTOM MENACE. Portman would go on to do better work in EPISODE II and III, but her wooden acting in the first prequel did not do her many favors.
Personally, I overlooked that element of her performance because the entire film had the feeling of a big budget B-movie, something that Lucas was striving for. Obviously, many didn’t feel the same way about it and just took Portman’s performance as bad. Needless to say, I am glad things worked out for her in the end and for us as STAR WARS: EPISODE VII – THE FORCE AWAKENS looks to be coming without those wooden performances.