Naomi Watts

Early roles and struggling career (1986–2000)

Watts's career began in television, where she made brief appearances in commercials.^[19] She made her film debut in For Love Alone (1986). It was set in the 1930s and based on Christina Stead's 1945 best-selling novel of the same name.^[23] In 1990 she appeared in two episodes of the fourth season of the Australian sitcom Hey Dad..!. At the 1989 premiere of her friend Nicole Kidman's film Dead Calm, Watts met John Duigan, who invited her to take a supporting role in his 1991 indie film Flirting.^[19][24] The film received critical acclaim and was featured on American critic Roger Ebert's list of the 10 best films of 1992.^[25] Also in 1991, she took the part of Frances Heffernan, a girl who struggles to find friends at a Catholic school in Sydney,^[26] in the mini-series Brides of Christ.^[27] She also had a recurring role in the soap opera Home and Away as the handicapped Julie Gibson.^[28] Watts was offered a role in the drama series A Country Practice but turned it down, not wanting to "get stuck on a soap for two or three years". She later said that decision was "naïve".^[19][21]

Watts took a year off to travel, visiting Los Angeles and being introduced to agents through Kidman.^[11][12] Encouraged, Watts decided to move to the United States, to pursue her career further. In 1993, she had a small role in the John Goodman film Matinee. She returned to Australia temporarily to star in three Australian films: another of Duigan's pictures, Wide Sargasso Sea; and the drama The Custodian. She had her first leading role in the film Gross Misconduct, as a student who accuses one of her teachers (played by Jimmy Smits) of raping her.^[19] Watts returned to Los Angeles and the US for good but had difficulty finding agents, producers and directors willing to hire her.^[12] She never worked outside the film industry, but had some tight times in which she was unable to pay the rent on time and lost her medical insurance.^[12][29]

"At first, everything was fantastic and doors were opened to me. But some people who I met through Nicole [Kidman], who had been all over me, had difficulty remembering my name when we next met. There were a lot of promises, but nothing actually came off. I ran out of money and became quite lonely, but Nic gave me company and encouragement to carry on."^[30]

When I came to America there was so much promise of good stuff and I thought, I've got it made here. I'm going to kick ass. Then I went back to Australia and did one or two more jobs. When I returned to Hollywood, all those people who'd been so encouraging before weren't interested. You take all their flattery seriously when you don't know any better. I basically had to start all over again. I get offered some things without auditioning today, but back then they wouldn't even fax me the pages of a script because it was too much of an inconvenience. I had to drive for hours into the Valley to pick up three bits of paper for some horrendous piece of shit, then go back the next day and line up for two hours to meet the casting director who would barely give me eye contact. It was humiliating.
–Watts on her early struggles^[21]

After nine auditions, she won a supporting role of "Jet Girl" in the futuristic film Tank Girl (1995).^[7] The film met mixed reviews and flopped at the box office. It has since become something of a cult classic.^[31] Throughout the rest of the decade, Watts took mostly supporting roles in films.^[32] Occasionally she considered leaving the business, but: "there were always little bites. Whenever I felt I was at the end of my rope, something would come up. Something bad. But for me it was 'work begets work'; that was my motto."^[11][29] In 1996, she starred alongside Joe Mantegna, Kelly Lynch and J. T. Walsh in George Hickenlooper's action-thriller Persons Unknown; alongside James Earl Jones, Kevin Kilner and Ellen Burstyn in the period drama Timepiece; in Bermuda Triangle, a TV pilot that was not picked up for a full series, where she played a former documentary filmmaker who disappears in the Bermuda Triangle;^[33] She had the lead role in Children of the Corn IV: The Gathering, in which children in a small town become possessed under the command of a wrongfully murdered child preacher.^[7]

In 1997, she starred in the Australian ensemble romantic drama Under the Lighthouse Dancing starring Jack Thompson and Jacqueline McKenzie. She also played the lead role in the short-lived television series Sleepwalkers.^[12] In 1998, she starred alongside Neil Patrick Harris and Debbie Reynolds in the TV film The Christmas Wish, played the supporting role of Giulia De Lezze in Dangerous Beauty,^[19] and provided some voice work for Babe: Pig in the City.^[12] She said in an interview in 2012, "That really should not be on my résumé! I think that was early on in the day, when I was trying to beef up my résumé. I came in and did a couple days' work of voiceovers and we had to suck on [helium] and then do a little mouse voice. But I was one in a hundred, so I'm sure you would never be able to identify my voice. I probably couldn't either!"^[34]

In 1999, she played Alice in the romantic comedy Strange Planet and the Texan student Holly Maddux in The Hunt for the Unicorn Killer. This was based on the true effort to capture Ira Einhorn, who was charged with Maddux's murder.^[35][36] In 2000, while David Lynch was developing the rejected pilot of Mulholland Drive as a feature film, Watts starred alongside Derek Jacobi, Jack Davenport and Iain Glen in the BBC TV film The Wyvern Mystery, an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Sheridan Le Fanu. It was broadcast in March of that year.^[12] She had some near misses for roles in her early career: she was considered for significant roles in such films as 1997's The Postman and The Devil's Advocate; all eventually went to other actresses.^[37]

In 2002 Watts recalled her early career in an interview. She had lost a role she wanted in "Meet the Parents" in 2000. She said, "It is a tough town. I think my spirit has taken a beating. The most painful thing has been the endless auditions. Knowing that you have something to offer, but not being able to show it, is so frustrating. As an unknown, you get treated badly. I auditioned and waited for things I did not have any belief in, but I needed the work and had to accept horrendous pieces of shit."^[30] Watts studied the Meisner Technique. She referred to this again in a 2012 interview. Watts said, "I came to New York and auditioned at least five times for Meet the Parents. I think the director liked me but the studio didn't. I heard every piece of feedback you could imagine, and in this case, it was 'not sexy enough'."^[38]

Rise to prominence (2001–2002)

In 1999, director David Lynch began casting for his psychological thriller Mulholland Drive. He interviewed Watts after looking at her headshot,^[38] without having seen any of her previous work,^[39] and offered her the lead role.^[38] Lynch later said about his selection of Watts, "I saw someone that I felt had a tremendous talent, and I saw someone who had a beautiful soul, an intelligence—possibilities for a lot of different roles, so it was a beautiful full package."^[40] Conceived as a pilot for a television series, Lynch shot a large portion of the film in February 1999, planning to keep it open-ended for a potential series. However, the pilot was rejected. Watts recalled thinking at the time, "just my dumb luck, that I'm in the only David Lynch programme that never sees the light of day."^[11] Lynch filmed an ending for the work in October 2000, turning it into a feature film, which was picked up for distribution. Mulholland Drive, also starring Laura Harring and Justin Theroux, premiered at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival to high critical acclaim and marked Watts's breakthrough. Reviewing her performance, Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian stated that "Watts's face metamorphoses miraculously from fresh-faced beauty to a frenzied, teary scowl of ugliness.";^[41] Emanuel Levy wrote, "... Watts, in a brilliant performance, a young, wide-eyed and grotesquely cheerful blonde, full of high hopes to make it big in Hollywood."^[42] The film and Watts received numerous awards and nominations, including the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Actress and a nomination for the American Film Institute Award for Best Actress.^[43] The surrealist film explored the story of aspiring actress Betty Elms, played by Watts. It sparked controversy over its strong lesbian theme.^[44][45]

Also in 2001, Watts starred in two short films, Never Date an Actress and Ellie Parker, and the horror film The Shaft, director Dick Maas's remake of his 1983 film De Lift.^[12] In 2002, she starred in one of the biggest box office hits of that year,^[12] The Ring, the English-language remake of the Japanese horror film Ring. Directed by Gore Verbinski, the film, which also starred Martin Henderson and Brian Cox, received favourable reviews and grossed around US$129 million domestically (equivalent to US$218.5 million in 2024).^[46] Watts portrayed Rachel Keller, a journalist investigating the strange deaths of her niece and other teenagers after they watched a mysterious videotape and received a phone call announcing their deaths in seven days.^[47] Her performance was praised by critics, including Paul Clinton of CNN.com, who said that she "is excellent in this leading role, which proves that her stellar performance in Mulholland Drive was not a fluke. She strikes a perfect balance between skepticism and the slow realisation of the truth in regard to the deadly power of the videotape."^[48] In the same year, she also starred in Rabbits, a series of short films directed by David Lynch; alongside several other famous British actors in the black comedy Plots with a View; and with Tim Daly in The Outsider, a western.

Established actress (2003–2007)

In 2003, Watts took the part of Julia Cook in Gregor Jordan's Australian film Ned Kelly, opposite Heath Ledger, Orlando Bloom and Geoffrey Rush.^[49] She also starred in the Merchant-Ivory film Le Divorce. She portrayed Roxeanne de Persand, a poet who is pregnant and abandoned by her husband Charles-Henri de Persand. Roxeanne and her sister Isabel (played by Kate Hudson) dispute the ownership of a painting by Georges de La Tour with the family of Charles-Henri's lover. Entertainment Weekly gave the film a "C" rating and lamented Watts's performance: "I'm disappointed to report that Hudson and Watts have no chemistry as sisters, perhaps because Watts never seems like the expatriate artiste she's supposed to be playing".^[50]

Her performance opposite Sean Penn and Benicio del Toro in Alejandro González Iñárritu's psychological drama 21 Grams (2003) earned Watts numerous award nominations, including her first nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actress, the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role.^[51] In the story, told in a non-linear manner, she portrayed Cristina Peck, a grief-stricken widow living a suburban life after her husband and two children were killed by Jack Jordan (Benicio del Toro). She became involved in a relationship with Paul Rivers (Sean Penn), an academic mathematician who was critically ill. She has said of the nomination, "It's far beyond what I ever dreamed for – that would have been too far fetched".^[52][53] The New York Times praised her: "Because Ms. Watts reinvents herself with each performance, it's easy to forget how brilliant she is. She has a boldness that comes from a lack of overemphasis, something actresses sometimes do to keep up with Mr. Penn".^[54] The San Francisco Chronicle wrote: "Watts is riveting, but she's much better in scenes of extreme emotion than in those requiring subtlety."^[55]

In 2004, Watts starred alongside Mark Ruffalo in the independent film We Don't Live Here Anymore,^[12] based on short stories by Andre Dubus. It explores the crises of two married couples who are friends and struggling in their lives.^[56] She reunited with Sean Penn in The Assassination of Richard Nixon, playing the wife of the would-be presidential assassin Samuel Byck (Penn).^[57] She teamed up with Jude Law and Dustin Hoffman in David O. Russell's ensemble comedy I Heart Huckabees.^[58] She headlined and produced the semi-autobiographical drama Ellie Parker (2005), which depicted the struggle of an Australian actress in Hollywood.^[59] The film began as a short film that was screened at the Sundance Film Festival in 2001. Over the next four years, it was expanded into a feature-length production. Film critic Roger Ebert praised Watts's performance: "The character is played by Watts with courage, fearless observation and a gift for timing that is so uncanny it can make points all by itself."^[60]

Watts starred in the sequel to The Ring, The Ring Two (2005), which despite a negative critical response,^[61] made more than US$161 million worldwide gross (equivalent to US$251.2 million in 2024).^[62] In 2005, Watts also headlined the remake of King Kong as Ann Darrow. She was the first choice for the role, portrayed by Fay Wray in the original film, and no other actors were considered.^[63] In preparation for her role, Watts met with Wray,^[64] who was to make a cameo appearance and say the final line of dialogue. Wray died at the age of 96 during pre-production.^[65] King Kong proved to be Watts's most commercially successful film yet. Helmed by director Peter Jackson, who had made The Lord of the Rings, the film won high praise and grossed US$550 million worldwide (equivalent to US$858 million in 2024).^[66][67] The Seattle Post-Intelligencer praised Watts's performance: "The third act becomes a star-crossed, "Beauty and the Beast" parable far more operatic and tragic than anything the original filmmakers could have imagined, exquisitely pantomimed by Watts with a poignancy and passion that rates Oscar consideration."^[68] Watts reprised her role as Darrow in the video game adaptation of King Kong,^[69] for which her voice performance garnered her significant praise. She was nominated for a Spike Video Game Award for Best Performance by a Female. Watts and the game's other cast members also won an award for Best Cast.^{[70][71][72][73]} Her other 2005 film release was Marc Forster's psychological thriller Stay, alongside Ewan McGregor, Ryan Gosling and Bob Hoskins.^[12]

At this point in her career, Watts said the following:

You'd better know why you're here as an actor ... I'm here to work out my shit, what my problems are and know who I am, so by cracking open these characters perhaps that shines a light on it a little bit better ... I know myself. I mean, of course I know myself better but the journey and search continue because hopefully we're evolving and growing all the time.^[74]

In the romantic drama The Painted Veil (2006), based on the novel of the same name by Somerset Maugham, Watts played the daughter of a lawyer and his wife. She is under pressure to marry and chooses a physician (Edward Norton) known as a bacteriologist.^[75] She is not prepared when her husband goes to Hong Kong, then a British colony, for work and then forces her to mainland China to a region suffering a cholera epidemic. Comparing her portrayal with Greta Garbo's in the original movie adapted from the same novel, the San Francisco Chronicle wrote, "Watts makes the role work on her own terms–her Kitty is more desperate, more foolish, more miserable and more driven... and her spiritual journey is greater.^[76] Watts also provided the voice of a small role, Suzie Rabbit, in David Lynch's psychological thriller Inland Empire.^[77] In the same year, she was announced as the new face of the jewelers David Yurman and completed a photoshoot that was featured in the 2007 Pirelli Calendar.^[18]

In David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises (2007), Watts portrays a Russian-British midwife, opposite Viggo Mortensen. She delivers the baby of a drug-addicted 14-year old prostitute.^[78] In its review, Slate magazine observed that she "brings a wounded radiance to the overcurious midwife Anna. Though it's a bit of a one-note role, it's a note she's long specialised in, a kind of flustered moral aggrievement".^[79] Eastern Promises grossed US$56 million worldwide, (equivalent to US$87.4 million in 2024).^[80][81] Also that year she was a producer and starred in Michael Haneke's Funny Games (2007). She played a mother who, with her family, is held hostage by a pair of sociopathic teenagers. It was a remake of Haneke's 1997 film of the same name.^[82] According to the UK's The Daily Telegraph, the director said that he agreed to make the film on condition that he be allowed to cast Watts.^[83][84][85] but The film was largely unnoticed by critics and audiences.^[86][87] Newsweek said that Watts "hurls herself into her physically demanding role with heroic conviction".^[88]

Biographical and independent films (2009–2014)

After a short hiatus from acting following the birth of her two children, Watts returned to acting in 2009, starring alongside Clive Owen in the political action thriller The International, in which she played a Manhattan assistant district attorney who partners with an Interpol agent to take down a merchant bank.^[89] The production was a moderate commercial success,^[90] grossing over US$60 million (equivalent to $85.2 million in 2024) worldwide.^[91] She next appeared in the drama Mother and Child,^[92] portraying the role of a lawyer who never knew her biological mother.^[93] ViewLondon found her to be "terrific as [her character], delivering a powerful performance that [...] isn't afraid to be unsympathetic".^[94] She was nominated for the Best Actress award at the Australian Film Institute Awards^[95] and for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Female.^[96]

Her next film, the Woody Allen-directed dramedy You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, opened at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival,^[97] and saw her portray Sally, a woman who has a troubled marriage with author Roy (played by Josh Brolin).^[98] It made over US$26 million (equivalent to $36.3 million in 2024).^[99] Her portrayal of Valerie Plame in the biographical thriller Fair Game followed,^[100] and marked the third pairing of Watts with Sean Penn after 21 Grams and The Assassination of Richard Nixon.^[101][102] The film earned Watts a Satellite Award nomination for Best Actress.^[103] In 2011, she appeared with Daniel Craig and Rachel Weisz in Jim Sheridan's psychological horror film Dream House, as the neighbour of a murdered family,^[104][105] and with Leonardo DiCaprio in Clint Eastwood's biographical drama J. Edgar, playing secretary Helen Gandy.^[106][107] While Dream House flopped,^[108] J. Edgar had a more favorable reception.^[109]

Watts starred in The Impossible (2012), a disaster drama based on the true story of María Belón and her family's experience of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami; she played the lead role, with her name changed to Maria Bennett. The film was a critical darling, had the highest-grossing opening weekend for a film in Spain,^[110] and made US$180.2 million (equivalent to $238.9 million in 2024) globally.^[111] Deborah Young of The Hollywood Reporter stated that "Watts packs a huge charge of emotion as the battered, ever-weakening Maria whose tears of pain and fear never appear fake or idealised,"^[112] while Justin Chang of Variety magazine remarked that she "has few equals at conveying physical and emotional extremis, something she again demonstrates in a mostly bedridden role."^[113] Damon Wise of The Guardian felt that "Watts is both brave and vulnerable, and her scenes with the young Lucas [...] are among the film's best."^[114] Watts earned nominations for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role, in addition to her second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress.^[115]

In Adore (2013), Watts starred with Robin Wright as two childhood friends who fall in love with each other's sons. On the film, critics concluded that Watts and Wright "give it their all, but they can't quite make Adore's trashy, absurd plot believable".^[116] She obtained the FCCA Award for Best Actress in 2014 for her role. The anthology comedy Movie 43 (2013) featured Watts as a devoted mother, alongside Liev Schreiber.^[117] Movie 43 was universally panned by critics, with Richard Roeper calling it "the Citizen Kane of awful".^[118]

In Laurie Collyer's independent drama Sunlight Jr. (2013), Watts starred with Matt Dillon as a struggling working-class couple.^{[119][120][121]} The San Francisco Chronicle, praising Watts and Dillon, wrote in its review for the film that they are "formidable actors at the top of their game here [...] exhibiting a remarkable chemistry".^[122] Watts portrayed the title role in Oliver Hirschbiegel's Diana (her final film released in 2013),^[115] a biographical drama about the last two years of the life of Diana, Princess of Wales. Released amid much controversy given its subject, the film was a critical flop.^[123][124] James Berardinelli found the film to be a "dull, pointless" production and remarked that while Watts did a "decent job encapsulating the look and feel of Diana", her portrayal was "a two-dimensional recreation".^[125]

Alejandro González Iñárritu's dark comedy Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014) featured Watts as the actress of a play mounted by a faded Hollywood actor (played by Michael Keaton).^{[126][127][128][129]} The film was the subject of widespread acclaim,^[130] and won four awards at the 87th Academy Awards including Best Picture;^[131] Watts and the other cast members earned the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Cast in a Motion Picture.^[132] Her other two awaiting projects were screened at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival. The dramedy St. Vincent starred Watts as a Russian prostitute. She learned the accent by spending time with Russian women in a West Village spa during a six-week period.^[133] Los Angeles Times reported a dividing reaction towards her performance, asserting that her part "put off some critics with its outrageousness", but "earned plenty of plaudits too".^[134] Watts earned a nomination for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role. In While We're Young, Watts starred with Ben Stiller as a New York City-based married couple who begin hanging out with a couple in their 20s. That film was an arthouse success and Watts received praise for her on-screen chemistry with Stiller.^{[135][136][137]}

Film and television work (2015–present)

Watts played rebel leader Evelyn Johnson-Eaton in Insurgent (2015), the second film in The Divergent Series, which is based on Veronica Roth's best-selling young adult novel of the same name.^[138] Despite mixed reviews, the film was a commercial success, grossing US$274.5 million worldwide.^[139][140] Watts reprised her role in the series's third instalment, Allegiant, released on 18 March 2016, to negative reviews and lackluster box office sales.^[141][142]

Watts starred in Gus Van Sant's mystery drama The Sea of Trees, opposite Matthew McConaughey, as the wife of an American man who attempts suicide in Mount Fuji's "Suicide Forest". The film premiered at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival where it competed for the Palme d'Or, but was heavily panned by both critics and audiences, who reportedly booed and laughed during its screening.^[143][144] Critic Richard Mowe stated the audience reaction should "give the film's creative team pause for reflection about exactly where they went so badly awry."^[145] Justin Chang of Variety also criticised the film, but commended Watts's performance for being "solidly moving and sometimes awesomely passive-aggressive."^[146] The Sea of Trees did not find an audience in theaters.^[147]

Like St. Vincent and While We're Young the previous year, Watts starred in two films—Demolition and Three Generations— which screened at the Toronto International Film Festival, in 2015. In Demolition, directed by Jean-Marc Vallée and opposite Jake Gyllenhaal, Watts played a customer service representative and the interest of a grieving investment banker (Gyllenhaal).^[148][149] The Wrap felt that she "empathetically captures [her] harried single mom" role as she played "both the wit and the sadness with grace".^[150] In Three Generations, directed by Gaby Dellal, she appeared with Susan Sarandon and Elle Fanning as the mother of a young transgender man (Fanning). Pulled from the schedule days before its intended initial release,^[151] the film subsequently opened on selected theatres in May 2017.^[152]

Watts played Linda, the second wife of heavyweight boxer Chuck Wepner (played by Liev Schreiber) in the biographical sport drama The Bleeder (2016), revolving around the life of Wepner and his 1975 fight with Muhammad Ali. Variety wrote in its review: "Slightly out of place as the feisty bartender who gives Wepner a second chance at his downest and outest, a spirited Naomi Watts nonetheless gives proceedings her best Amy Adams in The Fighter."^[153] She headlined the thriller Shut In (also 2016), playing a psychologist isolated with her child in a rural house during a winter storm. The film received largely negative reviews and made US$8 million worldwide.^{[154][155][156]}

Watts appeared in Twin Peaks, a limited event television series and a continuation of the 1990 show of the same name. It was broadcast on Showtime in 2017, to critical acclaim.^[157] Watts starred as "a therapist who begins to develop dangerous and intimate relationships with the people in her patients' lives" in the Netflix drama series Gypsy (also 2017), and served as one of its executive producers.^[158][159] While response was mixed, Gypsy was cancelled by Netflix after one season.^[160] In The Book of Henry (2017), Watts portrayed the mother of young genius who plans save the girl next door from abuse. The film polarized critics and audiences, but Rolling Stone described her as "a plus in any movie" and found her to be "excellent" in the role.^[161] In her other 2017 film, The Glass Castle opposite Brie Larson, and Woody Harrelson. An adaptation of Jeannette Walls's best selling memoir of the same name, Watts played the nonconformist mother of the author.^[162]

She played Queen Gertrud in Ophelia. In 2019, Watts portrayed Gretchen Carlson in the Showtime miniseries The Loudest Voice based on the book The Loudest Voice in the Room about Roger Ailes's sexual harassment of Carlson.^[163] She next starred in the films Penguin Bloom, Boss Level, and This Is the Night.^{[164][165][166]} In 2022, Watts played a lead in Netflix's The Watcher as Nora Brannock alongside Bobby Cannavale, who played Dean Brannock. In 2024, she starred in the anthology series Feud: Capote vs. The Swans as Babe Paley, for which she received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie nomination.