ALL WRIGHT NOW
Wonder Woman actress Robin is having the time of her life
You might know her as Buttercup in the classic 1987 rom-com The Princess Bride. Or as Jennie, the misguided rebel in Forrest Gump. Or maybe power suit-wearing, Machiavellian US First Lady Claire Underwood in TV drama House of Cards.
But landing the role of fierce warrior General Antiope in Wonder Woman means that at the age of 51, Robin has never looked better.
The mum-of-two and her Israeli co-star Gal Gadot were forced to bulk up and learn true warrior skills – such as cantering on horseback while wielding sheathes and arrows – for their roles in this year’s superheroine movie.
“We would do
horse riding for an hour, then drive from the stable to the studio and do weight training for an hour to build size,” tells Robin.
It would be challenging for even the fittest of stars, but for Robin, the mission was even greater because she was still filming House of Cards weeks after the other actors had begun training.
The first day she joined the Wonder Woman cast on set, she had her work cut out. “They were becoming Incredible Hulk females and I walk in, like, scrawny, bony me,” she recalls. “I’m like, ‘Dude, I’m the general!’ I had four weeks to get into shape. The most challenging thing was how much food you had to ingest just to put on mass quickly. That was sickening. And I loved getting injured just from doing too many squats! Some days, I couldn’t show up because
I was so injured.”
Slender physically maybe, but when it comes to issues of the heart, Dallas-born, San Diego-raised Robin, who was married to Oscar-winning actor Sean Penn from 1996 to 2010, is making big waves, becoming the unofficial spokeswoman for Equal Pay for Equal Work.
The issue came about when she demanded – and won – equal pay to House of Cards co-star Kevin Spacey, who was allegedly getting paid $500,000 per episode, while she was getting $420,000.
An activist for human rights in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Robin also co-founded Pour Les
Femmes, a sleepwear company whose profits provide funds for
Congolese women’s charities, encouraging them to start small businesses.
And when it comes to her relationships, she’s equally as passionate.
A devoted mum to her and Sean’s kids, daughter Dylan (26) and son Hopper (23), Robin turned down several big Hollywood roles over the years to spend time with her children, who have both gone on to become actors.
And Robin insists that her rollercoaster, on-off union with the famously volatile Sean brought many valuable lessons.
“I believe we were together not only to have our children but to learn how to love,” she mused of her on-off relationship with Sean, whom she dated after his high-profile split from Madonna in 1989.
When her divorce from
Sean went ahead in 2010,
Robin dropped the “Penn” part of her acting name, Robin Wright Penn.
In 2011, she met actor Ben Foster – 15 years her junior – on the set of Rampart and the pair were first spotted out together the following year, eventually confirming their relationship.
“I’ve never been happier in my life than I am today,” Robin gushed in March 2015, spilling some details on their sexy dynamic.
“He inspires me to be the best of myself. There’s so much to learn. It’s endless. How great! It took me a long time to grow up. Love is possible as life is possible.”
In a relationship that would become nearly as on-off as the Wright-Penn union, the couple became engaged in early 2014 but called it off on November 12, 2014, before reconciling in early 2015. They finally pulled the plug later that year and Ben is now engaged to Orange is the New Black star Laura Prepon (37), who is expecting the couple’s first child.
Last month, Robin, who has remained single since the split, was spotted out with ex-hubby Sean.
The exes looked very comfortable with each other as they arrived at a New York City apartment to visit their Hopper, who’s been filming his first big acting role in an upcoming movie called Puppy Love.
Whether or not the famously on-off duo decide to give their relationship another go remains to be seen, but there’s no doubt that Robin is a formidable woman in her own Wright!