Margot Robbie in Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (2020)

[Updated] Margot Robbie Doing Her Own Stunts? Can We Be Best Friends?

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We have been informed via an email tip that the behind-the-scenes video going around Twitter, in fact, features Margot Robbie’s stunt double, Renae Moneymaker, performing a stunt. The video is still awesome, and so are the stunt people who make our favorite movies possible. Original article follows below.

I love a celebrity who owns their stuff. Meaning the ones who willingly tell us they did not do certain stunts or the ones who at least try. There’s Tom Holland trying to do every bit of his Spider-Man work, Anthony Mackie praising his stunt double and their work together, and now there is proof that Margot Robbie tries to do most of her stunts and … I love her so much.

It’s hard to do stunts. That’s why there are stunt doubles. But sometimes, an actor just wants to put themselves in the thick of it and that’s fine too. To find out that Margot Robbie did probably one of the coolest sequences in all of Birds of Prey herself? I have no choice but to stan harder than I ever had before (remember, I will yell about Robbie deserving her Oscar for I, Tonya regularly).

The sequence in question comes when Harley is trying to get Cassandra Cain out of police custody to bring her to bad guy Roman Sionis (or get the Bertinelli diamond for herself). As all of Sionis’s hitmen and the city’s mercenaries are coming after both her and Cassandra Cain, she’s fighting against them with whatever she can find in the police station. In true Harley fashion, she grabs a bat first (looking absolutely delighted to see it) and uses it to break free along with the coolest leg split move I’ve ever seen.

And Margot Robbie did it all herself!

Using the same team from John Wick, stuntman and director Chad Stahelski came on to help lend his expertise to some of the movie’s fight scenes. Which—much like Halle Berry’s fight sequences in John Wick 3—came from a practical standpoint. More often than not, in too many movies, we watch as a woman somehow ends up with her crotch around a man’s face in a fight scene.

In Birds of Prey, that move was non-existent and instead, Harley and the Birds would fight as if they were actually their real-life sizes. Watching as Margot Robbie kicked out the ankles of her enemies rather than trying to throw a man three times her size was one of the reasons why I loved this movie so much. And now to see that Margot Robbie actually did it? I wish I was Margot Robbie, I wish she was my best friend, and maybe I’m in love. Who is to say.

Now, due to the COVID-19 quarantine going on around the world, Birds of Prey was released early on VOD so that we could all stay inside, stay safe, and watch it together. Especially rent it so we can all watch this fight sequence again and know that Margot Robbie flipped an entire man over her head using just her legs. Yes, I’m still not over it.

(image: Warner Bros.)

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Rachel Leishman
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Rachel Leishman (She/Her) is an Assistant Editor at the Mary Sue. She's been a writer professionally since 2016 but was always obsessed with movies and television and writing about them growing up. A lover of Spider-Man and Wanda Maximoff's biggest defender, she has interests in all things nerdy and a cat named Benjamin Wyatt the cat. If you want to talk classic rock music or all things Harrison Ford, she's your girl but her interests span far and wide. Yes, she knows she looks like Florence Pugh. She has multiple podcasts, normally has opinions on any bit of pop culture, and can tell you can actors entire filmography off the top of her head. Her current obsession is Glen Powell's dog, Brisket. Her work at the Mary Sue often includes Star Wars, Marvel, DC, movie reviews, and interviews.