Fast Five with Kate Mara
With Fantastic Four, Rooney Mara's big sister will finally step out from the shadow and into the bright lights.
Name Kate Rooney Mara
Born February 27, 1983 in Bedford, New York, USA
Filmography Nip/Tuck (TV Series, 2003), Brokeback Mountain (2005), 24 (TV Series, 2006), We Are Marshall (2006), Shooter (2007), Iron Man 2 (2010), American Horror Story (TV Series, 2011), House of Cards (TV Series, 2013-2014), Transcendence (2014), Fantastic Four (2015)
1 Brave new world
She describes herself as extremely shy and an introvert, yet these qualities push her to step out of her shell by embracing acting.
Even her parents were baffled when she announced her decision to become an actress.
"That's part of why I wanted to do it — for whatever reason, I was shy in my own skin, and when I was playing other people, I felt more confident," she told Flare magazine.
Unlike her younger sister Rooney who broke out with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo in 2011 and earning a Best Actress Oscar merely six years after stepping into Hollywood, the older Mara has yet to catch her big screen break.
But things are picking up for Mara, who won rave reviews for playing the intrepid reporter opposite Kevin Spacey in the drama series House Of Cards.
And with a lead role as superheroine Susan Storm in Fantastic Four, the time for this Mara to hog the limelight has come.
2 Superhero family
The petite red head went blonde to become brainy scientist Susan aka Invisible Woman, last played by Jessica Alba in the earlier Fantastic Four movies almost a decade ago.
This reboot, which opens here Aug 6, features Miles Teller as Reed Richards (stretchy Mr. Fantastic) Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm (fiery Human Torch) and Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm (role creature The Thing). The movie, directed by Josh Trank, chronicles how the foursome become imbued with new abilities after a teleportation experiment when wrong. They will need to learn to work as a team when Earth is threatened by Doctor Doom (Tobey Kebell).
The reason Mara joined Marvel's latest superhero family was because "it's a perfect blend of storytelling".
She told Flare: "'You do get that exciting, fantastical action-packed thrilling thing, but you also get the emotional and very real human part of who these characters are.
"The movie really is about family coming together and what lengths you would go to protect them."
3 One of the boys
In the same interview with Flare, she said that bonding with her male cast was easy as they were a group of playful dudes.
"The movie is very intense, so the set was an intense environment. But because of our dynamic, there was a lot of joking around.
"When you're having to emote a certain kind of energy and vibe all day, you need to joke around to let off some steam."
4 Football royalty
It is said that there's a unique clause in Mara's contract, one that states the actress is allowed to attend the NFL Super Bowl games if either the New York Giants or Pittsburgh Steelers are in the finals.
Reason being the game runs in her blood. Her maternal great-grandfather founded the Pittsburgh Steelers, and her paternal great-grandfather started the New York Giants; her father is a senior vice-president of the Giants today.
5 Mara in space
Following Fantastic Four, Mara will join Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain and Kristen Wigg in Ridley Scott's The Martian, which revolves around a space exploration to the planet Mars.
Opening here Nov 26, Mara was handpicked by Scott to join his team as astronaut and computer expert Beth Johanssen after seeing her performance in House Of Cards.
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