Scarlett Johansson revealed her frustrations with Hollywood’s early years, when she was forced to play the blonde bombshell role at an age too young.
On Tuesday’s Table for Two with Bruce Bozzi episode, the Black Widow actress reflected back on her early days as an aspiring actor. She recalled that the industry wanted to “sexualize” her when she was 18 years old.
Johansson explained, “I was 18 and 19 at the time and was learning about my sexuality and my womanhood. I also did Lost In Translation. I had just started my career and was still figuring out my identity as a woman. The trajectory I had been launched on was what led me to this. My agency, management, and other factors played a part. I felt like I got stuck.
She went on to say, “I played the other woman as well as the object of her desire.” “I suddenly found myself in this situation and couldn’t escape.”
Johansson, then 17 years old, played a woman who visited Tokyo, Japan, with her husband. She met Bill Murray, an older actor, with whom she formed a platonic relationship. She played an attractive maid in The Girl with a Pearl Earring. This painting was the most well-known by Johannes Vermeer.
Johansson said that she had “definitely been in situations which were not age appropriate” as a young actor in a episode from Dax Shepard’s armchair expert podcast.
She said, “Because everyone thought I was older. I had been acting for quite a while and after that I became pigeonholed in this strange hypersexualized thing.” It was as if that is the type of career you’ve had. “These are the roles that you have played and I thought, ‘This must be it’.”
Johansson took on more complex roles in her later career, including the role of the wife of a couple who are embroiled in conflict in Noah Baumbach’s Wedding Story and the mother of a German boy in World War II Taika Waititi’s Jojo Rabbit. Both of these performances earned Johansson Oscar nominations for the 2020 Academy Awards.