Newly minted Oscar nominee Lily Gladstone almost quit acting before her star-making turn in "Killers of the Flower Moon".
Back in 2020, the current Best Actress favorite was in the process of dusting off her resume and applying for jobs outside the film business before she received a call about Martin Scorsese's epic.
"You just wonder if it's going to be sustainable," she told the Hollywood Reporter in May about the place her acting career was at the time. "I had my credit card out, registering for a data analytics course."
The 37-year-old, who at that point had already received acclaim for her performance in Kelly Reichardt's "Certain Women", was even considering taking a seasonal job tracking murder hornets for the Department of Agriculture.
But her plans changed when she was offered the chance to star in "Killers of the Flower Moon" opposite Leonardo DiCaprio.
Gladstone was offered the role of Mollie, an Osage woman whose family was systematically murdered by the family and friends of DiCaprio's Ernest Burkhart in an effort to wrest away her wealth.
The role not only revitalized Gladstone's acting career, it also made her the first Native American ever nominated for Best Actress.
It's a level of recognition that Gladstone has aspired to even before she made it in Hollywood.
"Being known as an actress felt good even when I wasn't working, even before I got my SAG card," Gladstone told the New York Times earlier this month. "When people asked what I did: 'Yeah, I'm working at Staples right now, but I'm an actress.'"
Gladstone is next slated to appear alongside Riley Keough in the Hulu true crime drama "Under the Bridge."
Want to land your dream job in 2024? Take CNBC's new online course How to Ace Your Job Interview to learn what hiring managers are really looking for, body language techniques, what to say and not to say, and the best way to talk about pay. Get started today and save 50% with discount code EARLYBIRD.
