WITH her steamy shower scenes and sexy outfits, you might assume the much-hyped Sydney Sweeney is the centre of attention in new thriller movie The Housemaid.
Instead, critics are raving about her older co-star Amanda Seyfried as the standout of the film that hit UK cinemas yesterday.
Mamma Mia! actress Amanda, 40, is tipped for an Oscar nod for The Testament Of Ann Lee, which is out in February and sees her play the founder of the Christian fundamentalist Shaker Movement in the 18th century.
But it is The Housemaid, based on the same-named bestselling 2022 novel by US author Freida McFadden, that will be putting bums on seats first.
In the sexy flick, Amanda plays deranged housewife Nina Winchester, who hires 28-year-old Sydney’s Millie Calloway to take care of domestic chores and her daughter.
But nothing is what it seems in this psychological potboiler as Amanda — also famed for 2004 teen movie Mean Girls, as a student who believes her breasts predict the weather — steals the show.
Revelling in the role, she teases: “It’s dark as s**t. But when you get opportunities like that — to go nuts, go anywhere — I’m so happy I can still do it.
“There were ample opportunities for me to play unhinged, and playing unhinged is delicious. I had so much fun.”
In The Housemaid trailer, the two co-stars appear to be at each other’s throats. There is shouting, screaming and knives are reached for.
But in real life, fellow Americans Amanda and Sydney became great pals while making and promoting the film.
‘She’s a sweetheart’
For a bit of fun together, they even took a lie-detector test for Vanity Fair magazine, with a very animated Amanda asking Sydney whether her breasts were real.
Sydney is now caught in a storm over her recent “great jeans” ad, as some claimed its pun on “genes” hinted at white supremacy.
But Donald Trump, hailed it “the hottest ad out there”.
There have also been online rumours of her having romances with co-stars including Housemaid actor Brandon Sklenar and Glen Powell, who Sydney got steamy with in 2023 rom com Anyone But You. None of it was true.
Amanda knows about falling for a co-star, having dated Dominic Cooper from 2008 film Mamma Mia! for three years before the British actor reportedly broke her heart.
But asked about all the hype around pin-up Sydney, she told Vanity Fair: “I don’t envy anything she’s going through.
“I’ve spent a lot of time with her, we just hit it off immediately. She’s a sweetheart. I did not have a moment like she’s having, ever.”
If Sydney ever wanted to know more about the ups and downs of fame, Amanda would be a great person to chat to.
People would run into me and kids would be like, ‘Hey, can you tell us what your boobs are thinking?’ I got that so often, but I didn’t mind it’
Amanda Seyfried
Her pharmacist dad Jack and mum Ann, an occupational therapist, brought her up on a college campus in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
At school, Amanda started modelling then, in her teens, broke into acting with roles in US soap operas As The World Turns and All My Children.
This led to the “liberation and freedom of living on my own in New York City”, as her career took off.
She says: “I was having so much fun — paid a thousand dollars a day and working, like, three times a week — for a 17-year-old.”
The dream seemed to be over when the TV work dried up, and she enrolled at college.
But then an audition for mega-hit Mean Girls, which starred Lindsay Lohan and Rachel McAdams, saved her career.
Amanda says: “I was just happy to be working — big cheque.”
But playing that student who believes her boobs have superpowers led to some pointed questions from admirers.
She recalls: “People would run into me and kids would be like, ‘Hey, can you tell us what your boobs are thinking?’ I got that so often, but I didn’t mind it. I did my job, good enough, I guess.”
Four years later, she got the lead role of Sophie in Abba-inspired smash-hit movie musical Mamma Mia!, alongside Meryl Streep.
Amanda says of the much sought-after part: “I can’t f***ing believe I got that role but it felt like something I should be doing, could be doing.”
She was on a roll as further box-office success followed, including 2009 comedy-horror Jennifer’s Body with Megan Fox, 2010 romantic drama Dear John with Channing Tatum, and 2012 hit Les Miserables.
But not all of her career choices turned out well. She passed on the role of green alien Gamora in 2014 superhero blockbuster Guardians Of The Galaxy, only for it to take nearly £600million worldwide and spawn a pair of sequels.
The part was played instead by Zoe Saldana. Amanda says: “The offer came in and I was like, ‘I should take this, right? But this is going to be Marvel’s first bomb and I do not want to be ruined for the rest of my life. Who the f is going to see a movie with a talking raccoon?’”
But her later decision to star in an off-Broadway play in New York called The Way We Get By in 2015 was to have a major impact on her personal life. Co-star Thomas Sadoski would become her husband two years later.
She says: “We met, we came very, very close, and then we started seeing each other a year later — and now we have kids [a daughter born in 2017 and son born in 2020].”
Amanda had never intended to be a mum because she feared it might ruin her career.
But she says: “If you’re lucky enough to accidentally get pregnant, which was me twice, I’m just like, thank God. I would have been, ‘I’m too busy’, ‘I’m gonna disappear from Hollywood and it’s gonna be hard to get back on track.’”
If you’re lucky enough to accidentally get pregnant, which was me twice, I’m just like, thank God. I would have been, ‘I’m too busy’, ‘I’m gonna disappear from Hollywood and it’s gonna be hard to get back on track.’
Amanda
In reality, after getting pregnant, Amanda took only a few months off and discovered she was being offered “mum” roles by casting directors.
She says: “There’s something that happens to you when you become a mother or a father.
“You know, when your life no longer matters as much and you can’t live for yourself any more.
“That sacrifice also is very enriching and the roles got better. But it was funny how fast that happened. They’re like, ‘She’s pregnant. Is she pregnant? Oh, she had a baby. Oh, yeah, no, she’s a mom. She’s a mom now.’
“But I did play one character where I was not a mom, since then.”
One mum she played was silent film star Marion Davies in Gary Oldman’s 2020 movie Mank, about alcoholic screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz railing against 1930s Hollywood society while completing the screenplay of 1941 movie classic Citizen Kane.
That led to a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination in 2021, which in turn secured a starring role in the Disney+ series The Dropout, for which she won an Emmy and Golden Globe.
‘Weird dance’
Amanda says: “Going to the Oscars, you’re like, ‘I’m just happy to be here’, honestly. But it brought me up the casting list. I got the offer for The Dropout the next day.”
But there were restrictions on playing real-life character Elizabeth Holmes in The Dropout because the medical fraudster was not convicted until January 2022.
The programme’s lawyers even advised against sex scenes.
Amanda says: “Every script went through a team of lawyers.
“We couldn’t say certain things, we couldn’t do certain things. We couldn’t show them making love, so we had that weird dance scene because that was their foreplay.”
Every script went through a team of lawyers. We couldn’t say certain things, we couldn’t do certain things. We couldn’t show them making love, so we had that weird dance scene because that was their foreplay
Amanda Seyfried
Fast-forward to now, and her title role in upcoming period drama The Testament Of Ann Lee, about the UK-born Shaker Movement being taken to the US by Manchester lass Ann in 1774.
It sees Amanda shake ecstatically as the ultra-puritanical sect, which avoided earthly pleasures such as sex, celebrated the Almighty.
Also known for their pacifism, the Shakers’ number peaked in the mid-19th century but then declined with industrialisation, with only one active community remaining today, in Maine. Amanda says of Ann: “Nobody could have sex because sex, she thought, was the root of all evil — the root of why she was in so much pain.
“She had got pregnant and lost her babies.
“The idea that taking sex away could make you closer to wholeness is kind of beautiful. I think she’s nuts and also very cool.”
But despite her impressive credits reel, Amanda still reckons she must battle to stay on the “list” of most-wanted actresses in Hollywood.
She says: “These f***ing lists. Every time I’m auditioning it’s like I fluctuate. I fall down the list, I go to the top of the second list or keep going back to the bottom of the first list, and it’s like, I’m lucky to be on the list at all.”
But after The Housemaid, she shouldn’t need to worry about being on that Tinseltown A-list.
EROTIC AND CAMP
THE HOUSEMAID (15) 131mins
★★★☆☆
By LINDA MARRIC
A GLOSSY, erotic thriller that is as hilariously camp as it is suspenseful.
Adapted from Freida McFadden’s smash-hit novel by director Paul Feig and screenwriter Rebecca Sonnenshine, Sydney Sweeney stars as Millie, a young woman fresh out of prison.
She takes a live-in maid job at the lavish home of wealthy couple Nina and Andrew Winchester (Amanda Seyfried and Brandon Sklenar).
What initially promises a fresh start for the young woman, quickly turns into something far stranger as Nina’s wildly erratic behaviour borders on the theatrical, while Andrew’s “perfect husband” routine grows increasingly unrealistic.
Feig, usually known for his work in comedy, brings an over-the-top energy to this adaptation that makes for a fun, if slightly ridiculous, ride.
While his shift into psychological drama feels a bit bumpy, the film’s knowingly silly vibe is exactly what makes it so entertaining.
But it struggles with its own shifting tone and at 131 minutes, the pacing sags and several twists are made a little too obvious.
Sweeney does her best with the script but it is Seyfried who ultimately comes out on top here, putting in a brilliantly unhinged performance as Nina.
The Housemaid may lack subtlety and genuine menace but no one can deny that it is a great deal of fun from start to finish.