How did Natalie Portman escape the "Star wars prequels" curse?

[CyberCubed]

As most of us know, many of the actors from the Star Wars prequels never went on to do anything better besides the ones who were already established actors prior like Samuel L. Jackson, Liam Neeson, and so forth. We all know Jake Lloyd and Hayden Christensen had troubled careers after playing Anakin.

Natalie Portman was only 15/16 years old when she filmed Episode 1, so her career was pretty much in its infancy. How did she go on to become incredibly famous and have such a successful movie career?

[Prowler]

I don't know, man. Maybe she got lucky? Maybe she had a better agent? Or maybe her role wasn't good enough for her to be typecast and forever known as "that chick who was in the Star Wars episode 1"?

[TigerClaw]

I read that she wants to get back at doing Marvel movies again.
https://www.comicbookmovie.com/thor/thor_ragnarok/natalie-portman-now-open-to-returning-to-marvel-and-the-thor-a147807

[Powder]

By being super hot & decently talented.

But you could argue she was already pretty well established. Her performance in Leon The Professional was fantastic, & she was very young in it.

[turtle1237]

By being super hot & decently talented.

But you could argue she was already pretty well established. Her performance in Leon The Professional was fantastic, & she was very young in it.

That film pretty much put her on the map. I don't think the prequels could of ruin that. She was a child star after all.

[TheSkeletonMan939]

Keira Knightley has had a fairly strong career post-Star Wars.

[saintsaucey]

Keira Knightley has had a fairly strong career post-Star Wars.

Keira was barely in the star wars movies enough to matter and honestly most of her movies since (aside from the pirates franchise) have flopped. Domino and that King Arthur movie both sucked. Bend it like bekham was an indi and Those are honestly the only ones I can think of at the moment.

[sdp]

They're not the prequels course, same happened to the original trilogy, everyone got type cast with the exception of Harrison Ford who was already a name. Portman got lucky to not get typecast but I think she was doing other movies as Star Wars went on right? That helped her, I remember constantly seeing her on interview shows throughout the prequel trilogy while maybe the other actors just tried to wait after the movies and it was too late by then.
She was a child star after all.
So was Jake Lloyd.

[Andrew NDB]

Keira was barely in the star wars movies enough to matter and honestly most of her movies since (aside from the pirates franchise) have flopped. Domino and that King Arthur movie both sucked. Bend it like bekham was an indi and Those are honestly the only ones I can think of at the moment.

I really enjoyed her in London Boulevard.

Jil22M_EISU

[ssjup81]

I never felt Jake Lloyd was bad. Felt sorry for the kid after that. With Hayden, I didn't have much of a problem with him...I had a problem with the script dialogue. ><

[Andrew NDB]

Hayden was fine in Takers. Jumper was laughably bad, though arguably not his fault.

[ToTheNines]

Hayden was fine in Takers. Jumper was laughably bad, though arguably not his fault.

Nor was Star Wars his fault. No one could have pulled those lines off.

[saintsaucey]

Portman may have continued making movies, but I don't think she has ever done anything as great as the professional. Maybe black swan or v for vendetta

[Shark_Blade]

Because there is no "curse" like you stupidly alluded.

I never felt Jake Lloyd was bad. Felt sorry for the kid after that. With Hayden, I didn't have much of a problem with him...I had a problem with the script dialogue. ><I think Jake Lloyd was perfect. Hayden though............

[Cure]

Yeah, what curse? Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Sam Jackson, and even Ray Park still do stuff.

[saintsaucey]

Yeah, what curse? Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Sam Jackson, and even Ray Park still do stuff.

The op specifically said people who didn't already have a career

[The Deadman]

The op specifically said people who didn't already have a career

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natalie_Portman_filmography

Its not like Ep. 1 was the first movie of her career or anything.

[MsMarvelDuckie]

Harrison Ford wasn't already a name either. He was a minor actor working on set as a carpenter at the time of NH, and their first choice for Han ended up having to quit though I forget why. Star Wars was the movie that made his career- because of his role as Han he worked on Lucas's Indiana Jones films and THAT is why he became such a huge star. He played a lot of action hero roles, but Han was his first "big" starring role. Most of the original cast had decent careers afterward too- Hammil doing a lot of voice work, Fisher as a writer and script doctor, and even Williams doing minor (though recpgnizable) roles on TV and some movies. And Jines of course already had a good career going.

There is no curse. The actors involved have mostly all gone on to do other things, though some have stayed under the radar of stardom in favor of doing smaller roles but still keeping busy.

[CyberCubed]

Harrison Ford wasn't already a name either. He was a minor actor working on set as a carpenter at the time of NH, and their first choice for Han ended up having to quit though I forget why. Star Wars was the movie that made his career- because of his role as Han he worked on Lucas's Indiana Jones films and THAT is why he became such a huge star. He played a lot of action hero roles, but Han was his first "big" starring role. Most of the original cast had decent careers afterward too- Hammil doing a lot of voice work, Fisher as a writer and script doctor, and even Williams doing minor (though recpgnizable) roles on TV and some movies. And Jines of course already had a good career going.

There is no curse. The actors involved have mostly all gone on to do other things, though some have stayed under the radar of stardom in favor of doing smaller roles but still keeping busy.

I'm referring to the prequels only.

[ssjup81]

Because there is no "curse" like you stupidly alluded.

I think Jake Lloyd was perfect. Hayden though............But the terrible lines...I don't think many could've pulled that off in general.

[MsMarvelDuckie]

I'm referring to the prequels only.

Point was there was NEVER a curse it was just choices made on the part of the actors that made or broke their careers. Hayden certainly wasn't typecast- he was a relative newcomer and simply didn't take roles that were memorable enough (or good enough) to matter. Portman did. So it's no more a curse than there was in the original films.