Going for It

“Oh baby! Look at the world right now!”

Michelle Rodriguez is prepping for her next project—The Battle in Seattle with co-stars Charlize Theron, Woody Harrelson and Ray Liotta—but has plenty of time to rant about the state of things. “Look around you, girl!” she cries. “Whether you’re in Iraq or right here in Burbank, you see a lot of greedy people after money. But it’s good that someone’s taking a stand in a film like this.”

Rodriguez is nothing if not passionate, a quality that earned her rave reviews in her first role as the unstoppable girl boxer Diana Guzman in Karyn Kusama’s 2000 hit film Girlfight. All bravado on the outside but desperate for connection and affection on the inside, the character in many ways mirrors Rodriguez, who has a reputation for wild behavior but insists she only wants to communicate with the world.

Rodriguez initially thought she’d become a writer. “That’s one of the greatest forms of communication,” she explains. Living in New York and trying to make ends meet, she certainly wasn’t interested in going through what many of her actor friends were enduring - endless auditions that eroded confidence yet rarely paid off. But then she saw the notice about Girlfight and decided to go for it. And so began her journey into acting.

Girlfight required months and months of hardcore boxing training. It was grueling, but it paid off: Rodriguez landed a series of similar roles afterwards, including The Fast and the Furious, Resident Evil and BloodRayne. Earlier this year, she was cast as Ana-Lucia Cortez for several episodes of the hit show Lost, but her character was killed off (which may or may not be related to the fact that Rodriguez was arrested for drunk driving and did jail time).

Rodriguez isn’t afraid to talk about her fears, even boasting that she tackles them head on. Case in point - she was afraid of heights so took to skydiving. “If you’re scared of something, you have to fight it,” she says. “As long as your intent is good, you have to walk that line, otherwise, you’re going to go to your grave without any stories.” In her acting, Rodriguez also faces her fears directly. “I have to go to a real place to show emotion in a scene, and that’s scary for me,” she says. “It’s like being a kid again. When that camera goes on, I’m another person. I get nervous and that’s when it gets good.”

After Lost, Rodriguez is channeling her energies into her newest projects. They include a new clothing line, Ishkadada, which she describes as personality-driven. The collection features four “types” and is designed for mobile, media enhanced urbanites needing places to stash their equipment. “It’s kind of hard describing what I’m planning to a guy in a suit,” Rodriguez admits of the challenges she faces with investors. “But I ain’t stopping!”

Looking ahead, Rodriguez hopes to begin producing her own projects. She is currently working on a biopic about a South American rebel litigator who stood up for her beliefs in the 1950s. Indeed, as Rodriguez would testify, she certainly ain’t stopping!

(Source: Zoo)