When one runs a Google on Abbie Cornish, many of the usual suspects come back as options: “Abbie Cornish hot”…”Abbie Cornish Madonna movie”…”Abbie Cornish sexy”.
But “Abbie Cornish feet”?
Apparently, even the foot fetishists have jumped into the love-fest for the 29 year-old Australian who’s enchanted everyone from Comic-Con geeks to the Weinsteins and Madonna herself, who tapped Cornish in the early stages of casting for her romantic film W.E.: a fan and critics’ fave at the recent Toronto International Film Festival.
It’s anticipated that with the release of this highly-anticipated film, the entire world will learn that this star is determined to redefine the term “T & A”: in Cornish’s world, the acronym means “Talent” and “Acting Chops”. (OK, that’s actually “T & A & C”…but we said a new definition.)
Cornish is literally a farm girl: born in 1982 in the lush land of Lochnivar with a country department store as the town’s main attraction, she got curious about the horizon early in life, and started modeling at 13. Acting gigs came soon after, and she gained popularity with the country’s television viewers on a string of programs, including the very successful Wildside: a police drama that, according to www.tv.com, “redefined the word gritty.” The completely unscripted show earned Abbie an honor from the Australian Film Institute in 1999, and one year later, she stepped into the world of film. The Monkeys Mask, described by Rotten Tomatoes as “an unusual thriller”, was certainly that, with lesbian and erotic overtones that have undoubtedly made it a popular choice in many fanboys’ (and fangirls’?) Netflix queues.
Meatier television roles, along with a string of Australian indie pictures, had the adventurous vegetarian occupied for the next four years, always with the idea of returning to school for a veterinary degree in the back of her mind, until a breakout role came along in the form of Heidi, the leading character in the coming-of-age drama Somersault, opposite another Australian who’d go on to global fame, Sam Worthington.
Cornish suddenly found the world’s spotlight thrown upon her, with raves at Cannes and other leading film festivals…and suddenly, her feet were invited to try out more prominent film roles, too. In 2006, she starred opposite the luminous Heath Ledger in the edgy romance Candy. Russell Crowe was her leading man in A Good Year, and she also claimed a place in the cast of Elizabeth: The Golden Age, playing Sir Walter Raleigh’s secret wife. The romance novel crowd jumped on board her fan base with the release of 2009’s Bright Star: a gorgeous account of the romance between John Keats and fanny Brawne.
The title of that film was prophetic. In 2011, with key roles in two high-profile films (Sucker Punch, Limitless), Abbie’s “bright star” has certainly exploded in the Tinseltown galaxy. Sealing the deal: her role as Wally Winthrop in the Madonna-helmed W.E. This unique part, as a lonely, modern New Yorker obsessed with the love affair of King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, has earned Cornish a slew of extra notice—and probably a few new shoe offers—as perhaps the indie crowd’s new Gwyneth Paltrow: a put-your-tongue-back-in-your-mouth beauty, with more than a few lights on upstairs, too. And, oh yeah…those feet.
Watch out, Hollywood. Just wait until she discovers boots.