From The Falling To Dune Part 2

2018 was an eventful year for Florence Pugh, with projects including “King Lear” with Anthony Hopkins, the Liam Neeson thriller “The Commuter,” and the horror film “Malevolent.” Pugh’s most notable role from this year was in Netflix’s “Outlaw King,” which starred Chris Pine as the Scottish king Robert the Bruce. Pugh memorably played Elizabeth de Burgh, Robert’s wife and queen consort, who is historically enigmatic, leaving a lot of room for Pugh to turn her into a powerful character.

In an interview with W Magazine, Pugh explained that Elizabeth “has been written down as an add-on in history,” but when she began researching the character for “Outlaw King,” she found much more to the woman than history would lead you to believe. Even director David Mackenzie and Pine had nothing but glowing things to say about Pugh and how she brought authenticity to the role of Elizabeth, especially in her scenes opposite Pine’s Robert. 

However, the experience wasn’t exactly what Pugh had hoped for. Given they were shooting on the cusp of the #MeToo movement, Pugh couldn’t help but feel isolated by the film’s predominately male cast and crew, telling The Guardian, “It was an amazing moment because, while the industry was kicking off, it was like, ‘OK, yeah, here is an example where there aren’t that many women in this film and that is sad. But I get to be here, representing this woman whose storyline has been stripped from her.'”