Charlize Theron Credits ‘Arrested Development’ With Saving Her Career After A Notorious 2005 Box Office Flop

After locking down an Oscar for her command performance in Monster, Charlize Theron surprised audiences by starring as Rita Leeds, a recurring character on the third season of Arrested Development. At the time, the show hadn’t yet reached its cult status and was constantly on the verge of cancellation, which actually happened at the end of Theron’s season. Her character was strange (and wildly problematic in hindsight), but it’s still a solid highlight of Arrested Development‘s original magic before the unfortunate Netflix years. Let’s go with that.

As for how Theron ended up on the show, she recently admitted that she was trying to get ahead of Aeon Flux bombing at the box office, which she knew was going to be a “f*cking flop” from the minute she started filming. Worried that her career would be over, Theron wanted to do something that showed even more of her versatility, which Arrested Development provided.

Via The Hollywood Reporter:

It was one of the scariest things, to walk onto a set of a show that’s so developed and so brilliant. But I think I needed that, to put myself out there in a different way, because people thought of me as someone who was f*cking depressing, like my mother shot my father. [When Theron was 15, her dad came home drunk and threatened her and her mom with a gun, prompting her mother to shoot and kill him in what officials later determined was self-defense.] And I just f*cking loved that show, and this is going to sound so “poor me,” but I do feel like sometimes, as women, we get one shot.

Aeon Flux also taught Theron to be more like Tom Cruise when a movie isn’t working. “Shut this shit down, get four more writers on it and let’s figure this out,” Theron said, which she didn’t even know was a thing you can do. “F*ck, no one told me that was an option.”

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)