Rebel Wilson's guide to Hollywood
LOS ANGELES — Who says Hollywood isn't welcoming?
Five years ago, Rebel Wilson left Australia, where she was at the top of her game in the comedy scene.
What she found in Los Angeles was a strangely warm welcome.
"I remember when I first came out, Amy Poehler sat down at lunch with me at Chateau Marmont and told me this is how it is in America, what to expect. I was nobody here! I hadn't even done Bridesmaids yet," marvels Wilson, who returns to theaters this weekend as fan favorite Fat Amy in Pitch Perfect 2.
Poehler's sage advice? "She told me I have to generate my own roles, you won't be given the roles you want on a silver platter," she says. And Wilson took her word for it.
Last year Wilson, 29, was tied up in creating, writing and starring in her first American TV show, ABC's Super Fun Night (backed by Conan O'Brien), and recently sold a script to Universal. "I'm so lucky I get to develop movies for myself to star in," she says.
Wilson's got more on tap, including Sacha Baron Cohen's Grimsby, voicing a new panda in Kung Fu Panda 3 and, as of Friday, she'll start shooting the rom-com How to Be Single with Dakota Johnson. "We're playing besties in that," she says.
Lessons came with her quick ascent. Super Fun Night was canceled after just one season. "I'd never worked in American TV as a writer before and I really had no idea of the system — how you have your production company, the studio and the network all with opinions, all with rules about what's appropriate," says Wilson, whose bawdier bits were axed.
But there was a silver lining. "Weirdly, that turned out to be a great thing. My demand only rose because I wasn't doing movies," she says. "And then they were like, 'Rebel's back! Yay!' "
Audiences will likely have the same reaction to the return of Fat Amy in Pitch Perfect 2. Wilson stole the screen in the 2012 hit with the a cappella singer's addictive confidence and go-for-broke jokes.
Wilson, who was an ace student in school, swears that she ditched her plans to become a lawyer or politician after hallucinating she won an Oscar during a bout of malaria in Africa years ago. Today, she says, she owns Fat Amy's name. "Some rappers have 'Fat whatever.' Or 'Big whatever,' " says Wilson. "I don't even see it as a derogatory term, really.
"You know, there's a power in reclaiming something people see as a negative. When I was trying to become an actress, people thought maybe something like your size is a disadvantage. But I turned that into a positive and a distinguishing factor between me and the other girls."
And Wilson's just starting. "You don't start off getting amazing roles like Fat Amy given to you, but you work your way up and earn respect from different people in the industry," she says. "So now I kind of feel like the sky's the limit."