Modest Celebrity

I read an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal ("Playing Harder To Get," Friday August 18th) about actress Rachel McAdam’s unwillingness to jump at every movie script thrown at her and her desire to "live a life first." I was very impressed by the portrait they painted of her. We had already heard about her walking off the set of a Vanity Fair Oscars Edition photo shoot when she found out the participants were going to be nude. (This led to her firing the publicist who had arranged to have her pose nude for the shoot without, apparently, letting her know about the proposed nudity.) But I was also impressed by reports that she takes public transportation in Toronto, her hometown, and that she volunteered her services in Louisiana last year after Katrina struck. What I like in particular about the latter report is that this was the first I had heard of it. Unlike some other actors who seemed to have capitalized on their charity, McAdams kept a very low profile. (I actually found it difficult to find any info, outside the WSJ article, about McAdams in post-Katrina Louisiana.)

Don’t get me wrong. I am not canonizing Rachel McAdams but I am always happy when I can report some good behavior coming out of Hollywood. The movie industry has a way of stripping an actress of more than just her clothes. So often you hear that these starlets become self-obsessed narcissists and I believe it takes a pretty strong character to not give in to that impulse (an impulse that people surrounding the stars seem to hope to hook them on). I can’t help wondering about the connection between her modesty and her good character. Is her modesty just one of many virtues, or has being modest in a very immodest industry supported her other virtues?

Maybe by preserving her modesty, McAdams was also able to preserve her humanity.

Comments

[Cmarie]

I don't know if I would classify Rachel as one who is preserving her modesty in the industry, because she has been nude in at least one film called "My Name Is Tanino" (2002)
It is possible that she has just changed her values over the last few years, but it could very well just be a marketing strategy. Either way, the less vulgarity in the current media the better

[Rachel]

also, according to the links you posted, McAdams starred in Wedding Crashers, which I haven't seen, but from what I have heard is a very vulgar movie.