- NEWS
- COMPETITION
- DIRECTORY
Cristin Milioti’s goal is to emulate Michael Keaton’s varied career.
When she was starting out in the acting business, the How I Met Your Mother star was taken out to lunch by an agent who was interested in taking her on and asked whose career she wanted to emulate and he was surprised when she named the veteran actor, who is known for his roles in Beetlejuice, Batman and Birdman, among many other movies.
“The first name out of my mouth was, ‘Michael Keaton!’ And he goes, ‘No, no, I mean, a woman! A woman’s career,’” she recalled to Rolling Stone. “And it was like, well, listen, I could name you tons of women whose work I love! But that wasn’t what you asked me. I want to be Beetlejuice. I want to be Batman. I want to be Birdman! You know what? I probably have a Multiplicity in me, too! It was this repeat of, ‘That thing you want? We’re not going to give that to you.’”
The actress went on to recall a meeting she had with a different casting agent, who delivered a “hugely helpful” wake-up call that had a big influence on her career, just a few years later.
“(She said), ‘And every time you come in here, Cristin, you just give me some Blake Lively impression!” she said, referring to the Gossip Girl star. “She just point-blank told me, ‘Stop all of that. I want to see what you can do, not what you think you should be.’ It was this Earth-shattering epiphany for me because it reminded me, right, there’s a reason I chose to do this.”
Cristin is currently starring alongside Andy Samberg in Palm Springs, a time loop wedding comedy, which made history in January as the biggest sale to come out of the Sundance Film Festival ever.