Russell Crowe to Actresses: Don’t Complain about Lack of Roles, ‘Act Your Age’

Russell Crowe dispensed some advice to his fellow thespians in this month’s issue of Australia’s Women’s Weekly, telling the magazine there are plenty of film roles for older actresses – if only they would accept them.

“The best thing about the industry I’m in – movies – is that there are roles for people in all different stages of life,” Crowe told the magazine. “To be honest, I think you’ll find that that the woman who is saying that (the roles have dried up) is the woman who at age 40, 45, 48, still wants to play the ingenue, and can’t understand why she’s not being cast as the 21-year-old.”

Crowe continued, saying that women who are comfortable in their “own skin” can still continue to find roles, despite their age.

“Meryl Streep will give you 10,000 examples and arguments as to why that’s bullshit, so will Helen Mirren, or whoever it happens to be. If you are willing to live in your own skin, you can work as an actor. If you are trying to pretend that you’re still the young buck when you’re my age, it just doesn’t work.”

“The point is, you do have to be prepared to accept that there are stages in life,” Crowe continued. “So I can’t be the Gladiator forever.”

While Crowe is correct about Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren’s success as older actresses, he seems to forget that he is still playing “young buck” action roles; Crowe has appeared in a number of recent action movies, like the Man With the Iron Fists, Robin Hood, and State of Play. Crowe also portrayed Noah in the Biblical movie of the same name.

And while there certainly is, and will continue to be, a place for older women in Hollywood, Vulture points out with a series of nifty graphs that increasingly, leading men in films age, but their onscreen love interests do not.