From the Runway to Playing a Runaway: Supermodel Cara Delevingne, a Profile

Models who become actresses—there are quite a lot of them. Fewer who can really act. Looks and talent are two very different things, but when they sync up, you get a Hollywood star.

In most ways, the better-looking, the easier life gets, so women (and men) with arresting countenances, Greek-statue bodies, and the discipline to hew to exacting fashion industry proportions—have half the game beat.

New York acting coach Allen Savage, when asked to define charisma, said “extreme beauty can be a form of charisma.” People get mesmerized and hypnotized by it, can’t take their eyes off it, bow down to it. We dare say it’s godlike.

Which is probably what sitting in front of a 22-foot-high movie screen is: a secular form of deity worship. Which often starts on the catwalk. Which brings us back to modeling agencies as a feeder system for acting.

Introducing …

Cara Jocelyn Delevingne is one such (British) fashion model. They’d thought maybe she was the new Kate Moss, but it’s looking more like she’s becoming the anti-Kate Moss, ditching the runways for the big screen.

At age 10, Delevingne made her modeling debut with famed photographer Bruce Weber. After leaving school in 2009 and signing with Storm Model Management, she won the British Fashion Awards’ Model of the Year award in 2012 and 2014.

She began her acting career with the 2012 film “Anna Karenina,” and is currently starring in the American high school coming-of-age film “Paper Towns.” Delevingne also sings, plays guitar and drums, and beatboxes.

The 22-year-old Burberry model, who’s also the face of high-fashion lines like Fendi and Chanel, best known for her striking eyebrows and sticking her tongue out at the camera, is also known for running around dressed up as bananas and hot dogs, and instigating lots of on-set fun. In addition to which, she’s been deemed the real deal by film critics.

Critic Curation

New York Magazine/Vulture’s Bilge Ebiri: “Delevingne is so good, so magnetic, that there’s a palpable drop in pressure after she vanishes.”

Pete Hammond of Deadline Hollywood Daily says, “Delevingne has a face the camera loves and clearly a future in movies. “

Sandy Schaefer of ScreenRant says, “Delevingne succeeds at portraying Margo as the enchanting wild-child that her peers believe her to be, while also subtly communicating that something very different may be going on below her surface.”

Justin Chang of Variety calls her “the real find of the film.”

Choosey

She’s been rejecting cliché roles normally offered to models, and waiting for her shot. Normally one does not turn down roles in Hollywood, since newcomers are beggars and can’t afford to be choosers, but Delevingne chose to stay true to her dignity, having felt that she’d already compromised enough as a model. Her role model is former model and Oscar winner Charlize Theron.

Related Coverage

Could LeBron James Be a Hollywood Leading Man?

She’s already played a super-baddy in the DC Comics 2016 film “Suicide Squad,” has four new film projects in the pipeline, and has been featured in a Taylor Swift video. She’s set to star in Luc Besson’s upcoming science fiction film “Valerian.”