Why Has Jessica Chastain Never Connected With Movie Audiences?

She's an idiot. She has some talent, but no brain matter.

She was worthy of her Oscar for The Eyes of Tammy Faye. I also liked her a lot in The Help.

Looks?

She’s woke but also closeted lez. Audiences don’t know what to make of her.

How do you know she's a lez?

Have you ever scene her with some new hot actor?

There's no there, there sexually

She's a ginger so she's possessed by the devil!!

Woke as hell and she just doesn't have that it/charisma/pop factor.

Veganism probably. Too leafy.

I am surprised she hasn't connected more with the public. She's actually one of the most fan friendly celebs. She's incredibly accessible and does it all - pictures, autographs, etc.

She should've done some romcoms to soften her image. Plus, romcoms help actresses build a female fanbase.

she is a red head. People don't prefer red heads.

R12: Yeah she did too many ice-cold bitch roles - Zero Dark Thirty, Miss Sloane, Molly's Game.

she's not fuckable

Seems uptight.

[Quote] She’s woke but also closeted lez.

Love how r4 says that as if it doesn’t compute that she could be both.

What’s “woke,” r4? Please explain.

The public finds her unrelatable.

Bryce is more relatable and they look alike.

[Quote] yet somehow she fails to score with movie going public.

Sorry, what? How are you measuring that?

Or is this “I don’t like her so nobody must?”

I love her

She lacks warmth.

Smelly pussy.

One of my favorite actresses working today. She is very talented.

She lacks talent.

She’s a good actress and enjoyable to watch, but she’s a similar type to better known actresses (Emma Stone, Amy Adams) and has never had a role that distinguishes her from the rest in any wide, public way. She came on the scene playing adult characters in adult movies, while some of her contemporaries (Anne Hathaway, Emma Stone, Amy Adams) first hit it big in teen-oriented content and moved from that to ingenue and then adult roles, with hits at each stage.

If her private life has any impact on her fame, it’s probably because she keeps it private. She’s never had a marketing push as girl next door/mom next door in an attempt to project a relatable image.

She has a cold screen presence, and she mostly picks wannabe awards bait projects to star in, which makes her performances feel labored.

Are you people high? She works constantly and has an Oscar. How is she not a success?

He face just screams Lifetime Movie grade.

If you have to ask...

Jessica married Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo in 2017, and they have two children ages 5 and 7.

R4 R5 R6

she stinks of Julliard

I think she's a fine actress. Not sure where OP's premise is coming from. She's busy acting and producing, has many acting noms and wins, and this week got her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

[Quote] Chastain won the Academy Award, SAG Award, and Critics Choice Award for "The Eyes of Tammy Faye."

[Quote] She also earned Emmy, Golden Globe, and SAG nominations for Showtime's "George & Tammy," and received a Tony nomination and Drama Desk Award for "A Doll's House on Broadway."

[Quote] She also got Oscar nominations for "The Help" and "Zero Dark Thirty."

Jessica grew up in a single-parent household with two other siblings. There were a lot of times they all went hungry when there wasn't enough money to buy food. She went to community college and attended Julliard on a scholarship funded by Robin Williams.

She describes herself as shy and sensitive, which might come across as aloof or cold to someone who doesn't know her I suppose.

Her hair color is natural. She was mocked for it and her freckles while growing up but now takes pride in her hair and does not want to dye it.

Getting a star is easy as long as you have $75,000.

I don't know. People just don't like her.

Other school children made fun of Jessica’s coat of many collars - St. Laurent 1988 - because it was 1990.

And, I heard her aunt’s name was Bemish.

No "it" factor

She lies about her age.

She hates men. Daddy issues.

She's astounding in Scenes from a Marriage but also playing opposite Oscar Isaac helped. That's an amazing show.

She isn't "cute." The public tends to support actresses who can be play goofy rom-com heroines with a bit of "ohh, I'm such a silly billy!" feel to them, in real life as well as on screen. She is beautiful, cold, fashionable, married to an italian count, plays a lot of complicated women... Not enough, "ooh, I tripped and fell in front of that cute guy I was stalking!"

She gave the only performance worth watching in Crimson Peak.

I do confuse her with Eva Green sometimes.

She messy.

Eva Green is constantly, irritatingly stagey-phony.

Chastain is like a half-empty vessel, with raw drive filling the vacancy.

Other than Zero Dark Thirty (if I even got that right) I couldn't name a single film she's been in and I forgot she won an Oscar. If you tell me she did I believe you, but this news is just more endless award stuff.

It was so special in the 70s when there were barely fifty years of Academy Award winners and now there's almost a hundred. It's not as special anymore if these nobodies all have one!

You don't watch movies, r46. Why would anyone value your opinion when it comes to which actors are good or not?

She’s a boring actress. Not a bad actress but a very dull one. As soon as she’s offscreen in a film you happily forget she was ever in it.

I liked her in Molly's Game. It was a good role that benefited from good writing.

R5 and R31, people have talked about her for years, including here.

Here are some blind items from Blind Gossip, CDAN, The Gossip Life, and Mr. X (courtesy of AGC):

February 1, 2016

[quote]No one knows why this foreign born A- list mostly movie actor who does have a television show and a franchise, keeps openly pining over this A list mostly movie actress who is an Academy Award winner/nominee not named Jennifer Lawrence. The actor and actress in question are both gay. They both like to pretend otherwise but whatever relationships they throw out for cameras are fake. [italic]Tom Hiddleston (Loki in "Thor") and (tv series "The Night Manager")/Jessica Chastain[/italic]

September 14, 2017

[quote]I think we all knew from her history that this marriage would be unusual. We are not being disappointed. This A+ list mostly movie actress who is an Academy Award winner/nominee is traditional. She got married to have children. She also doesn’t want to do IVF. She only sees her husband the few days per month that she is ovulating. Other than that, they lead separate lives. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo[/italic]

October 29, 2017

[quote]It really is the strangest marriage this side of Kelly Rowland. This A/A+ list mostly movie actress just finished up her three days a month she spends with her husband while she is ovulating. She talks to him several times a week but only ever wants to see him those three days. It is going to be fascinating to see if he shows up during award season at all or if she will be attending solo and with relatives. Maybe Michelle Williams will let her borrow Busy. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo[/italic]

February 18, 2018

[quote]The last time we saw the new husband of this A- list actress he was hooking up with a closeted A list mostly movie actor. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo/Tom Cruise[/italic]

October 24, 2018

[quote]This married A-/B+ list actress who is an Academy Award winner/nominee has been hooking up with another woman for a couple of months. I don't know if the husband of our actress knows. He does now though. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo[/italic]

September 3, 2021

[quote]This foreign born former A+ list athlete/model has tried to have relationships with men. They never work out. She loves women. She is telling friends that she has found true love with this A list actress. [italic]Maria Sharapova/Jessica Chastain[/italic]

December 17, 2023

[quote]This A list actress is an Oscar winner/nominee. She has a great story about a breakup. The thing she doesn't tell in the story is that the breakup was with another woman who then went on to marry a man and then our actress copied her. [italic]Jessica Chastain & Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo/Jess Weixler & Hamish Brocklebank[/italic]

August 25, 2025 [quote]This married actress is being threatened with a lawsuit by her long time former girlfriend. The husband knows about the girlfriend, but the public doesn't. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Jess Weixler/Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo[/italic]

January 17, 2014

[quote]This A list mostly movie actress/Academy Award winner/nominee has always been reclusive and stand offish. Something in the past couple of months has changed about her though and the actress who once would barely acknowledge fans or be spotted in the daylight has turned into an entirely different person. She actually went on a date last week and the actress was all over her date. Everywhere they went. Maybe she is on meds? A complete 180. Someone actually said the actress was fun now. Never a word associated with her previously. [italic]Jessica Chastain[/italic]

November 27, 2015

[quote]For a hell of a long time this B-list actress refused to do certain roles because she considered them too commercial or too thin (role without a lot of layers), but her attitude has changed lately. After several of her auteur-directed efforts flopped critically and commercially, she’s now happily taking roles in big budgeted pulp. Don’t let the persona fool you. She’s just a big of a game player as the rest of them. [italic]Jessica Chastain "The Huntsman Winter's War[/italic]

December 26, 2017

[quote]Asking this A/A+ list mostly movie actress to actually do something about diversity which would cause her any kind of personal sacrifice or backbone is not going to happen. She is always working behind the scenes to hire friends of hers rather than anyone of color. [italic]Jessica Chastain[/italic]

May 20, 2019

[quote]This very outspoken A/A- list mostly movie actress who has multiple Academy Award wins/nominations always likes to call out horrid behavior by others. Apparently though, she is fine though with the behavior of her foreign born A- list co-star even though his own family hates him for that behavior. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Michael Fassbender ("X-Men Dark Phoenix[/italic]

April 19, 2023

[quote]Alt Accounts: This A list actress is an Oscar winner/nominee. She is also trying to game play a way to an EGOT within the next few years. She is also the actress with the most alt accounts that she uses to troll people she doesn't like and to boost her own projects. By some estimations, she has about 10-15 alt accounts on each social media platform. She has developed back stories for each account and has names and histories for each of the accounts. These are not just nameless and faceless one time troll accounts. These are fully developed characters. Just to make sure she doesn't actually forget to sign out of an account, there are different phones assigned to each account. Just like the characters, each phone is different. Some are Android and some are iPhones. She even has one phone that is a flip phone that has internet access. She even goes so far as to give them different cases and downloads different apps on each. The only thing that makes them similar is they all have a sticker on the back with the name of the person on it. The only reason the stickers are on the phone is because her assistants don't know them all by heart. Our actress knows them all without stickers. Maybe this is why she is such a great actress? [italic]Jessica Chastain[/italic]

That's crazy, if true.

June 13, 2023

[quote]Outside the theatre, this A list actress who is an Oscar winner/nominee didn't want to take a chance and be photographed next to this superhero actor who is causing all kinds of problems. Inside the the theatre though the actress sat next to the actor and talked to the actor throughout the movie. [italic]Jessica Chastain/Ezra Miller/”The Flash[/italic]

Jodie had the same kind of cinema awkwardness but then she came out and can be herself. Jessica needs the same. She’s also attracted to roles where she’s pretty and that fades without growing up and stop playing dolls.

I love Jessica Chastain. She’s beautiful and I love her acting style and choices. I would like to see her in roles that are the female equivalent of what Jack Lemmon got into. I think she could really swing out, carrying comedy and drama/pathos. On one hand, her transformation into roles using hair, makeup, wardrobe, etc. has cemented her reputation as someone who can completely inhabit a role. There’s a certain natural-ness I’d like to see more of from her. Maybe a turn at a modern Norma Rae or Silkwood type of story.

I do watch movies, r46. Just not any of hers, I guess.

She sounds like an interesting person from her bio. No nepo, real struggles, quite a bit of actual impressive acting study.

She's doing fine. Not every actress has to try and be "america's sweetheart".

She’s just forgettable.

Good actress, but she gives off "Cunt" vibes. Still, others have succeeded with that same issue so maybe it's the projects she picks. They all seem to be arthouse dearies or mega-commercial flops. She should ask Scarlett Johansson for some career advice.

She was great in the “Jurassic World” movies.

She reads as cold and unrelatable. Always. The one exception was in The Help where she should have won her one Oscar for supporting. She has no business winning Leading. She’s given one other good performance, in “Scenes of a Marriage” and it’s because she plays a miserable, mean bitch. It’s a difficult role and she pulls it off with aplomb.

^ I agree with that. Anne Hathaway waked away with that silly psychological thriller they made even though Chastain had the more complicated character arc.

I’ve only seen a couple of her movies in which she’s been a supporting character in a large cast. The most memorable thing I remember about her is the clip where’s she’s making a red carpet appearance with Oscar Isaac for their movie and he reaches out and strokes her arm. You say she’s a lesbian? It was one of the most erotic things I’ve seen. It screams “affair”.

R62 = Jessica, looking to squash those lesbo rumors.

She was a disappointment in A Most Violent Year. She was given nothing to do. I imagined her as a Lady Macbeth type. I’d kind to see the role that ended up on the editing room floor.

She's far too superhet for the general public's tastes.

I don’t understand the claim that she’s “never connected.” She’s been in a ton of smashes (The Help, Interstellar, The Martian, It: Chapter 2) even though she didn’t (and wasn’t expected to) “open” them. She’s an Oscar winner who regularly gets small passion projects made (she was superb in Michel Franco’s Memory in 2023). She stays out of the tabloids (other than the CDAN fanfic posted upthread).

It’s kind of an ideal career if you ask me.

An actress who cites Clara Bow and Isabelle Huppert as inspirations and casually references Brecht in interviews is never going to be America’s sweetheart. I don’t find her pretentious—this is just what interests her—but it’s not something the general public relates to. Meanwhile, someone like Jennifer Lawrence talking about farting, inhaling pizza, and quoting Dumb and Dumber will always come across as livelier and more accessible to the masses.

That said, I admire Chastain as an actress. I respect that she put in the training, stuck it out, and didn’t break through until her mid-thirties. My only red flag is that she’s best friends with Anne Hathaway, who has a reputation for being a nightmare to crew members.

[quote] Meanwhile, someone like Jennifer Lawrence talking about farting, inhaling pizza, and quoting Dumb and Dumber will always come across as livelier and more accessible to the masses.

She really is disgusting white trash.

She possesses a career 99.9999 percent of industry performers would sell a kidney to have. But this is Datalounge, where unless you’ve reached Julia Roberts in the 1990s level of stardom, you’re a complete failure. Meanwhile, this place mostly hates Julia in spite of or for her success. You really can’t win here.

People are still calling Marlon Brando a rapist because this bitch read 4 words out of context and decided she wanted to see herself as women's savior. Screw her. Imagine being a family member of his and having to hear that.

I saw her do Ibsen on Broadway and it was one of the chilliest, most uncharismatic performances I’ve ever seen, and not in the chilly way Ibsen intended.

R70 The controversy about that scene from Last Tango in Paris began with actor Maria Schneider's own words in an published 2007 interview, before her death in 2011.

[Quote] She remembered what happened on the day of filming that scene, in which her character is raped by Brando's, using butter as a lubricant. "That scene wasn't in the original script. The truth is it was Marlon who came up with the idea. They only told me about it before we had to film the scene and I was so angry… I felt humiliated and to be honest, I felt a little raped, both by Marlon and by Bertolucci. After the scene, Marlon didn't console me or apologise," she said. "Marlon said to me: 'Maria, don't worry, it's just a movie,' but during the scene, even though what Marlon was doing wasn't real, I was crying real tears.

[Quote] "Thankfully, there was just one take."

I loved Jessica in Scenes from a Marriage.

She had a lovely apartment at The Osborne. That's as much as I can offer about her. That and that she's not Julianne Moore.

I think I've seen her in a role or two but she left no good nor bad impression.

Closer investigation would show that she mentioned the butter part was what was improvised, not the other stuff or the scene itself, and everyone had been on record 100 times,including Schneider, saying the sex had always been simulated, yet the dimwit went on a rampage saying Brando ass raped her in front of the cameras and was teying to get the movie banned. And that has stuck and the bitch never once cleared up or apologized.

And no one mentions that Brando himself said he felt violated by Betolucci in the movie, so much so he refused to speak to him for decades and said he would never make a movie that personal again but of course we have to demonize the dead white holywood actor.

Like Jennifer Lawrence, she gives off the vibe of someone who fucked their way into a career. They're both decent actresses but nothing special.

R75 It was the director has said it was only the addition of butter that was new to the scene already in the script. Have you seen anything stated by someone other than him or Brando stating the sodomy scene wasn't in the original script? I haven't. I've read excerpts from two different interviews by the actress. If it was just about using butter as lubricant, why didn't she specify that? I find that difficult to understand.

Here's an excerpt from a 2006 interview article with Maria Schneider in the Irish Independent:

[Quote] The film tells the story of a young French girl and a middle-aged man who meet in a dilapidated flat in Paris to have anonymous sex. It broke taboos and its distributors were prosecuted for obscenity. But Schneider says that the infamous scene in which Brando sodomises her character with the help of some butter was not in the original script. "Marlon had the idea. When they told me, I had a burst of anger. Woo! I threw everything. And nobody can force someone to do something not in the script. But I didn't know that. I was too young. So I did the scene and I cried. I cried real tears during that scene. I was feeling humiliation. Then six or seven years ago I heard that the character I played was supposed to be a boy. That maybe explained it." She lets out another husky laugh.

I think it was the sodomy scene itself that she objected to. She says "the scene was not in the script" not just an added item (the butter) which she was so upset over.

R75 From an interview article with journalist and writer Vanessa Schneider, who wrote a book 'My cousin Maria Schneider':

[Quote] Vanessa Schneider (through translator):

Maria was older than I am a journalist, but I had already written novels. And Maria told me one day that she'd like to tell her version of things, since she had already said in interviews that she had been abused in a famous scene in "Last Tango in Paris," this scene of sodomy, which had not been written in the script. She wanted to say what kind of woman she was, what kind of actress she was beyond the scene in "Last Tango." And she wanted me to write a book with her.

[R76] Brando was 48 at the time of filming Tango, with a lot of life experience as well as knowledge of and power within the industry. Schneider was only 19 and new to films, on set surrounded by older, powerful men, without anyone present advocating for or protecting her. If Brando felt vulnerable and exposed, imagine how that young, inexperienced woman felt in that situation.

(Sexual assault covers a lot of behaviors, not just penetration.)

R78/R79 there are next to no interviews of Schneider. The one excerpt that alludes to that scene comes from that one quote. Bertolucci explained what he think she meant and Schneider wasnt there to corroborate because she was dead. But thats enough to call Brando a rapist, a man also dead who cannot defend himself or give his account because people are so creepily enamored of female sexual victimhood.

According to Bertolucci the sodomy scene was in the script.

R80 This is an excerpt from the book 'My Cousin Maria Schneider' by Vanessa Schneider

[Quote] One morning, Bertolucci takes Brando aside and suggests a scene that isn’t in the script. The men agree that nothing should be said to tip you off—that it’s better if you are taken by surprise. Did you sense a particular atmosphere on the set that day, complicit looks between the director, actor, and crew? Or were you too tired by that point to question anything? Who thought of the butter? Was it Brando, as Bertolucci claims, or Bertolucci, as Brando insists? Rolling, action… You and Brando are lying on the floor, dressed. Suddenly, Brando turns you over, roughly pulls down your jeans and, grasping a mound of butter in his hand, he shoves it between your legs while thrusting his pelvis against you. You fight, you scream and cry. It’s impossible to escape; Brando’s body is pinning you to the floor. Bertolucci keeps the camera trained on your anger and terror. There’s only one take. Afterward Bertolucci says, “C’est bon.” That’s good. It doesn’t last long, but for you it’s an eternity. Brando releases his grip and you scramble up, staring at the two of them with murderous rage. In your furor, you destroy the set: tear down the drapes, shatter a vase, a lamp; anything you can get your hands on, you smash onto the wooden floor. After, you go to your dressing room and remain prostrate for hours. The director couldn’t care less; he got what he wanted. He couldn’t have dreamed of better. “She raged against me, against Marlon, against all men,” Bertolucci would comment years later, remembering the scene.

[Quote] You come out of the filming shattered, sensing this one scene has marked you forever, like a bad tattoo you’ll spend the rest of your life trying to cover up. It doesn’t matter that the sodomy was simulated—it makes you feel dirty and violated. You don’t understand that you could’ve prevented this scene from appearing in the film since it wasn’t in the script that you had agreed to. You could’ve called a lawyer, filed suit against the producers, and made Bertolucci cut it, but you’re young, alone, and poorly counseled. You know nothing yet about the rules and regulations of the film world. The perfect victim.

[quote] She remembered what happened on the day of filming that scene, in which her character is raped by Brando's, using butter as a lubricant.

Schneider tried to make some money in the 70s shilling a low-grade margarine called "I Can't Believe It's Not Sodomy!"

R82 Yeah let me treat a book written by Maria's cousin who wasnt even there as gospel...

R84 Go ahead and ignore Maria's own words from interviews and her cousin's book and regard what powerful men in the film industry say is the truth about what happened to a beautiful young woman under their direction and control. Nothing new about that approach.

In any infinitely long social media thread, the odds that the butter scene in Last Tango in Paris is mentioned approaches 1

I think the main reason is that she has little to no personality. She comes across a bit as a blank slate—not necessarily aloof, but there seems to be a real lack of personality to me. This of course contributes to her lack of charisma. She’s a good actress but just not an interesting person. I’ve never thought “Wow, Jessica Chastain—I’d really like to know more about her.”

R85 I read Maria's words. What you posted wasnt that

She mostly leaves me cold. I was especially underwhelmed by her performance in Zero Dark Thirty—she seemed to be reciting lines vs acting and creating a fully fleshed out character.

I don't like her nose.

[quote] She was a disappointment in A Most Violent Year.

The movie was, not so much Jessica.

R89 Her character was a composite of several real life people. What kind of fully fleshed out character was she going to play in a procedural where the focus is on finding Bin Laden, not on her charcater?

R91 = Bob Hope

I mean, r90 = Bob Hope

I totally forgot about Crimson Peak /

Is that worth catching? Didn't hear anything about it

I just read that “from” Bryce Dallas Howard. They do seem the same type except for the nepo part.

Fuckable, OP? Really? Would you fuck her?

[quote]Is that worth catching?

No.

[quote]Didn't hear anything about it

Just how the cast and crew like it.

Because that other red head, Bryce Dallas Howard, is much prettier.

I think R87 has it. She's a talented actress, but she lacks an underlying screen charisma or presence. I don't think she's ever felt truly honest or vulnerable in her performances; something seems closed off about her. She would benefit from committing to something messy or raw.

Like Anne Hathaway (another pretty, talented actress), everything that Chastain does feels…synthetic? You’re always aware that she’s “acting,” nothing feels natural nor casual about her performances. I did think she was good in “A Most Violent Year,” though.

Chastain was warm in The Help. Nicole Kidman, for example, could never have played that role. I think it's true that Americans like their leading ladies "cute". Anyway, Chastain got her star on the Walk of Fame last week.

Throwing the link in for anyone who hasn't seen it, because it's a hoot.

R18 I assume me you’re referring to Bryce Dallas Howard? She doesn’t have the likability factor or superhetness Chastain has.

Howard was badly miscast as Elton John’s mother in Rocketman.

R82 does she mention they were going to film that scene with them singing?

The opening lines were:

🎵 Get tha buttah. Get tha buttah. Get the buttah nowwwwww🎵

She’s always seemed like a bitch to me. It’s possible I have her confused with someone else though.