‘About Time’: Was Rachel McAdams Just Born to Fictionally Time Travel?
Rachel McAdams is one of Hollywood’s most beautiful and revered actresses, well-known for her roles in comedies such as Wedding Crashers and romantic dramas like The Vow. In recent years, McAdams has focused her efforts on hard-hitting dramas like Spotlight, but she’s never forgotten her roots as a romantic comedy star, and for many fans, she’s at her best when involved in a sweet love story. Some of McAdamcs’ most popular roles involve a rather out-there concept, and on at least three occasions, the actress has starred in movies about time travel.
How did Rachel McAdams become famous?
Rachel McAdams was born in Ontario, Canada, in 1978. Growing up as the eldest of three children, McAdams was drawn early on to a career in figure skating, before the lure of the theater pulled her in. When she was very young, McAdams was involved in student school productions, even directing a number of plays. By 2002, after McAdams had graduated from college, the young performer made her movie debut by appearing in the comedy The Hot Chick.
Just two years later, McAdams received her big breakthrough role when she was cast in Mean Girls, the cult-classic comedy that featured a star-studded cast, including McAdams as high school queen bee Regina George. Critics and audiences alike praised McAdams’ work in the film, and over the next several years, she appeared in some of the biggest movies of her career, including The Notebook, Wedding Crashers, Red Eye, and The Family Stone.
Rachel McAdams has starred in three big time-travel movies
Rachel McAdams quickly made a name for herself as a queen of romantic films. While The Notebook might be McAdams’ biggest romance flick, she’s also appeared in such films as About Time, The Time-Traveler’s Wife, and Midnight in Paris. All three of those movies feature star-filled casts — and all of them feature some element of time travel.
The Time Traveler’s Wife, released in 2009, co-starred Eric Bana as a time-traveling man who knows McAdams throughout many stages of her life. Midnight in Paris was released to theaters in 2011, a fantasy-comedy that featured Owen Wilson as a screenwriter who travels back in time each night at midnight. Finally, McAdams’ most recent time-travel movie, About Time, tells the story of a young man, played by Domhnall Gleeson, who travels back in time in hopes of improving future events in his life.
What did Rachel McAdams say about her tendency to be featured in time-travel films?
While Rachel McAdams has appeared in three movies involving time travel, the actress has noted that she herself has not gotten to experience the magic of traveling through time and space. “It’s pretty unfair,” she said in a 2013 interview, discussing her work in the movie About Time. “I’ve now done three films with time travel in them and I’ve not gotten to time travel once so I’m kind of bitter about that. (But) I think it just made it all a little smoother that not everyone was allowed to know.”
Even if McAdams has not gotten to time travel, her roles in those three movies have been significant. The actress has been the grounding force in all three instances, providing the stable backbone for the more mercurial male characters. Still, it is long overdue for McAdams to land her own time-traveling gi – and considering that the actress is still one of Hollywood’s A-listers even after two decades in the game, perhaps she will get her chance in the near future.
