Michelle Monaghanmight be making waves in the latest Thailand-set season ofThe White Lotus, but she’s an actress who has starred in a wide range of movies and television series over the past 20 years,a career that could be traced back to her fortuitous casting in a movie that didn’t do well at the box office but helped Monaghan get noticed. That movie wasShane Black’s directorial debut,Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, a neo-noir action comedy from the writer ofLethal Weapon, which pairedRobert Downey Jr., a fallen ’80s star looking for a comeback, withVal Kilmer, one of the biggest stars of the ’90s.
In the movie, Downey plays New York street criminal, Harry Lockhart, who is mistaken for an actor and sent to L.A. to shadow Kilmer’s private detective Perry, the two of them instead being roped into a murder mystery with Monaghan as a struggling actress with a past connection to Harry.
Monaghan Offered a Refreshing New Face Next to the Two Vets
When Monaghan was cast in the lead female role for Black’s action-comedyKiss Kiss Bang Bang, she had only appeared in a few small film roles, as well as on television, including a recurring role onDavid E. Kelley’s seriesBoston Public.Her role as Harmony Faith Lane was a pivotal one to the story, as Robert Downey Jr.’s Harry Lockhart reunites with his childhood crush in L.A., years after Harmony left their small town to find her runaway sister. Harmony quickly gets roped into the murder mystery that Harry has been investigating with Perry.
Monaghan’s performance was a ray of sunshine within the dark comedy, but what really put that performance over-the-top was when she shows up at Harry’s hotel absolutely plastered. She plays such a charming drunk, it’s easy to see why Harry maintained such a big crush on her for so many years. By that point in the movie,Monaghan had already won the viewer over with her performance that mixed fresh-faced naivety with the world-weariness that comes with trying to make it as an actor in Hollywood.
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“In a former life I used to exhaust myself navigating crude men who thought they were clever.”
Kiss Kiss Bang Bangwas not a box office success by any means; Warner Bros. seemingly did not know what to do with it and barely gave it much of a release in October 2005. It made less than $5 million dollars in its North American release. Even so, the movie would be discovered eventually, and so would Monaghan, as she began to get a lot of attention from filmmakers likeDoug Limanand theFarrelly Brothers, who cast Monaghan in their filmsMr. & Mrs. SmithandThe Heartbreak Kidremake. But it was her casting byJ.J. AbramsasTom Cruise’s love interest inMission: Impossible IIIthat might have had the most impact. In fact, she once toldColliderhow nervous she was about having intimate scenes with the superstar. “I worked hard to get that role, and it was just one of those things,” Monaghan stated. “But I was very nervous, of course, the night before, and then proceeded to have just an amazing shoot with J.J. and Tom, and I have all the respect for them and that franchise.”
Of course, Downey would end up achieving a new height of fame when he was cast by Marvel Studios to play Tony Stark in their 2008Iron Manmovie. Eventually, he would help bring hisKiss Kiss Bang Bangdirector Shane Black on board to write and directIron Man 3.Downey may have also been an influence on filmmakerTodd Phillipscasting Monaghan to play his pregnant wife in the 2010 comedy,Due Date.
By then,Monaghan had already been quite successful, being cast in a slew of movies, including the action movieEagle EyeoppositeShia LaBeouf; the romantic comedyMade of HonorwithPatrick Dempsey, fresh fromGrey’s Anatomy; and the critically-respected indie,Trucker. She would also appear in Oscar-nominated films likeNorth Country, oppositeCharlize Theron, and inBen Affleck’s directorial debut,Gone Baby Gone, and that was all within the first five years followingKiss Kiss Bang Bang.It’s hard to fathom any of those roles would have happened ifKiss Kiss Bang Banghadn’t gotten other filmmakers and actors interested in working with Monaghan despite it doing so horrendously at the box office.
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
After being mistaken for an actor, a New York thief is sent to Hollywood to train under a private eye for a potential movie role, but the duo are thrown together with a struggling actress into a murder mystery.
