Anne Hathaway has revealed she spent a whole week preparing to play Harley Quinn before realizing Christopher Nolan actually wanted her to be Catwoman, and had to perform a quick personality switch mid-meeting to save the day.
Talking about Happy Sad Confused podcast, Hathaway described the elaborate reasoning that led her to the wrong conclusion prior to her meeting with Nolan for The Dark Knight Rises.
“I knew I was auditioning for… I met with Chris for the female role in Batman trilogy, next episode. I thought I played it off because I was just like, ‘It can’t be Catwoman because Michelle Pfeiffer was so iconic… It’s going to be Harley Quinn!'”
Armed with that conviction, she spent a week preparing.
“I spent a week developing demonic Harley Quinn energy. I was wearing weird jester flats and a striped top,” she said.
Then, two hours into what she had probably assumed was a very productive meeting, Nolan revealed the truth.
“Chris is like, ‘So, the part is Catwoman,’ and I was like, ‘Transform!'”
Her pivot was immediate.
“I decided right then that I was like, ‘Well, this top is very sensual’. And I wanted to be very… like a psychopath. I changed personalities like a psychopath.”
The quick recalibration clearly worked.
Hathaway landed the role and was widely praised for her portrayal of Selina Kyle in the 2012 film.
It was the beginning of a significant creative partnership with Nolan. The director cast her again as NASA scientist Dr. Amelia Brand Interstellar in 2014, a role that had particular significance given the difficult period Hathaway was navigating at the time.
She has spoken candidly about the public backlash that followed her Oscar win for Les Misérableswhich made her something of a cultural punchline.
“A lot of people wouldn’t give me roles because they were so worried about how toxic my identity had become online,” she shared Vanity Fair in 2024.
“I had an angel in Christopher Nolan, who didn’t care and gave me one of the most beautiful roles I’ve had in one of the best films I’ve been a part of.”
The pair reunite again for The Odyssey, which opens in theaters July 17 from Universal Pictures.
Presumably this time Hathaway knew exactly which character she was playing before the meeting.
