Sydney Sweeney has been turning heads with the launch of a new jeans campaign that is so sexy it’s been hailed as ‘the end of woke’.
So what on earth is the 27-year-old star of Euphoria and The White Lotus doing playing a bloodied female professional boxer with blackened eyes, taped-down breasts and cracked teeth in her latest film?
The answer is simple: she’s going for an Oscar.
Last week the first images of a snarling Sweeney from Christy, an £18million biopic about pioneering lesbian boxer Christy Martin, were released to an incredulous reaction from the star’s legion of fans, including her 25 million Instagram followers.
One wrote: ‘I can’t believe this transformation. The world is about to find out if Sydney actually has acting chops.’
The movie, which tells the story of an American fighter who was sexually abused and later nearly killed by her husband, will premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September, traditionally a fertile launching ground for Oscar hopefuls.
On Saturday night, an executive with a major Hollywood studio said: ‘Her fans may be shocked, but this isn’t anything new.
‘Sydney has proved herself as a sex bomb and a really successful actress. Now she’s on the hunt for an Oscar. And to get an Oscar everyone knows you have to make a beautiful woman ugly. That’s just how it is.
Sydney Sweeney, pictured, has been turning heads lately with some successful advertising campaigns
So what on earth is she doing playing a bloodied female professional boxer with blackened eyes, taped-down breasts and cracked teeth in her latest film? She’s going for an Oscar
Sweeney is following a well-trodden path. Charlize Theron, the towering former catwalk model, famously put on 30lb, bleached and thinned her eyebrows and wore a set of prosthetic crooked, stained teeth to portray the serial killer Aileen Wuornos in 2003’s biopic, Monster
‘Sydney had casting directors breaking down the door to her agent’s office to offer her blockbusters, but she chose to go for a relatively low-budget film which will show off her acting skills. It has “Oscar campaign” written all over it.’
Sweeney is following a well-trodden path. Charlize Theron, the towering former catwalk model, famously put on 30lb, bleached and thinned her eyebrows and wore a set of prosthetic crooked, stained teeth to portray the serial killer Aileen Wuornos in 2003’s biopic, Monster.
Bingo! The star of hits such as The Italian Job and Mad Max: Fury Road bagged herself her one – and only – best actress Oscar.
Then there’s Nicole Kidman. The willowy Australian starred in Batman Forever, Moulin Rouge, Cold Mountain and a string of other blockbusters, but it took a giant prosthetic nose and dark wig in 2002’s The Hours, in which she played tortured novelist Virginia Woolf, for her to finally nab a Best Actress award.
Meanwhile, Hilary Swank – once best known as one of the stars of the soapy 1990s TV show Beverly Hills 90210 – strapped down her breasts, lost 10lb and cut her hair short to play a girl posing as a boy in the 1999 film Boys Don’t Cry.
The following year she was Oscar’s belle of the ball, beating Meryl Streep, Annette Bening and Julianne Moore to win the coveted best actress gong.
It launched her movie career and helped her amass a reported £50million fortune.
But it’s a ploy that doesn’t work every time. Margot Robbie, irked by people saying she was too beautiful to be taken seriously as an actress, donned prosthetics and played a pockmarked Queen Elizabeth I in Mary Queen Of Scots, opposite Saoirse Ronan.
Then there’s Nicole Kidman. The willowy Australian starred in a string of blockbusters but it took a giant prosthetic nose and dark wig in 2002’s The Hours for her to finally nab a Best Actress award
But it’s a ploy that doesn’t work every time. Margot Robbie was irked by people saying she was too beautiful to be taken seriously as an actress. So she donned prosthetics and played a pockmarked Queen Elizabeth I in Mary Queen Of Scots, but the movie bombed
When Gywneth Paltrow, pictured left in 2024, donned a fat suit for the 2001 comedy Shallow Hal, right, she earned herself a panning from the critics, while feminists slammed her for ‘fat shaming’
Angelina Jolie, pictured left in 2024, won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Lisa Rowe in Girl, Interrupted in 1999, pictured
Alas, the movie bombed and Robbie went back to playing beauties like Barbie and Cathy in the new movie adaptation of Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights.
And when Gwyneth Paltrow donned a fat suit for the 2001 comedy Shallow Hal, she earned herself a panning from the critics, while feminists slammed her for ‘fat shaming’.
Still, if Sweeney’s attempt to ‘ugly up’ fails, she will always have a lucrative sideline as a clothes horse.
Her new advertising campaign for American Eagle clothing, in which she wears a barely-there white cotton string vest and tight-fitting denims, and seductively touches her bottom, saw the company’s shares soar 10 per cent in one day – giving the store chain a £150million boost.
