Mixed martial artist and actress Ronda Rousey will be taking on Patrick Swayze’s role in the remake of Road House. In the 1980s action film, Swayze played a bouncer employed to clean up the roughest bar in Missouri. As undefeated female bantamweight champion, Rousey is the perfect fit for a role that involves breaking limbs in the fight for justice.
Gender swapping has become more frequent in the film industry, with many upcoming movies starring women in leading roles originally designed for men.
Here are other trailblazing female actresses redefining gender roles in Hollywood:
1. Charlize Theron is set to star in The Gray Man, a thriller about a CIA operative fighting his way across Europe to save his children. She snagged the role from Brad Pitt, who had been in talks with Sony earlier this year. The company’s bosses were so impressed with Theron’s performance in Mad Max: Fury Road that they decided to readjust the script for a female lead.
2. Sandra Bullock plays a political campaign manager in Our Brand Is Crisis, out later this month. The lead role was originally written for the film’s producer George Clooney. At this year’s Toronto Film Festival, Bullock spoke out about the sexism in Hollywood that makes women want to take male parts. ‘We’re complex, crazy little creatures,” said Bullock. ‘We deserve to have stories that reflect that. And normalise that instead of it being a rarity.’
3. Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon, and Leslie Jones star in a female-led remake of The Ghostbusters. Although Chris Hemsworth and Paul Feig also co-star, Wiig and McCarthy are the central pair who come to the rescue when ghosts invade Manhattan. We’re excited for the reinvention of this 80s classic.
UPDATE: 8/12/2015
4. Gwendoline Christie has been cast as the first ever female Star Wars villian, Captain Phasma. Star Wars: The Force Awakens, released on 18 December, will see Gwedoline joining the Dark Side in a hefty suit of armour. She told Entertainment Weekly: 'This is a very progressive female character... We see Captain Phasma, and we see the costume from head to toe, and we know that it is a woman. But we are used to connecting to female characters via the way they look, from the way they are made flesh." We're hoping she'll get a cool lightsabre too!
