Aussie actress Rebel Wilson has more than made it as one of Hollywood’s comedy queens. From her roles in hit films such as Pitch Perfect, How To Be Single and Bridesmaids Wilson has shown Hollywood that if a film needs laughs then she is the person for the role.
Now Wilson teams up alongside Anne Hathaway in the brand new comedy heist film – The Hustle, a take on the old film Dirty Rotten Scoundrels… and once again their laughs a plenty.
“The Hustle is essentially a story about a high class con woman played by Anne Hathaway and a low rent con woman played by me… yep typecasting,” says Wilson with a big laugh. “I do want to make it clear that I have never conned anyone in real life, but yeah the low-rent thing that is often associated with me. Penny is such a hustler, and I know that is the title of the film but she really is. I love that her comedy comes from all angles, like she has some good jokes, she is quite crass and she has a lot of physical comedy in the film. I get to play some different personas as Penny as well. She is kind of a ruthless con woman but she also has a heart – you see that in the film and I thought that was a nice turn for her.”
Playing opposite the character of Penny is Hathaway’s con-woman Josephine somebody she admires straight away. “When Penny meets Josephine she is like wow,” explains Wilson. “This woman clearly does the same thing that I do but does it much more successfully. Josephine is like forty times richer than Penny when you meet her and she is like ‘how can I be her?’ And I can really relate to that because I know when I first met Anne Hathaway I was like ‘oh… how can I be that? – So glamorous, so talented and such a great actress. Anne was just so awesome to work with. She is such an amazingly talented actress and also a brilliant singer. We would sing all the time between takes, we were both kind of dorks who were in acapella groups at some time. We had the best time filming this, the film is essentially a two-hander with Anne and myself so it really did rely on our chemistry together and I had never worked with her before but was such a fan so luckily as a producer I was able to cast her in the movie and luckily she said yes and it really was just a wish come true.”
“I am just so proud of this movie and to be the producer on it along with Roger is just like a real honour,” says Wilson as she talks a little bit about her producing role on the film. “Firstly to re-boot Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is an honour because it is such a classic comedy. Then to be able to put my own comedic spin on it was just really cool. I hope that audiences are going to love this film because it’s two women teaming up to kick ass and I mean there is so much comedy in the film and so much glitz and glamour with the film set in the south of France. It is just a great romp with a good story and if you love the original I’m sure you are going to like our changes and be interested in our re-imagining of the characters and the cons in the film, and if you’ve never seen Dirty Rotten Scoundrels then I think you are just going to be in for a great comedic movie.”
The Hustle is in cinemas today.
[imdb style=”transparent”]tt1298644[/imdb]
