Abbey Lee_creative — The Collective

ABBEY LEE

PORTFOLIO

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COVERS

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@abbeylee

Abbey Lee is an Australian actor at the top of her game.

From a very young age, Lee had a vivid imagination. Born in Melbourne in 1987, her childhood was spent dressing up in wild outfits and dancing in the garden, playing with imaginary friends and dreaming up fantastical stories. Though she was always creative – art and drawing were an early outlet for her – she didn’t grow up with aspirations of becoming an actor. Lee had to find her own path towards a life in the arts.

It began when she was 15 and was scouted by a modelling agent while on a beach holiday on the south coast of New South Wales. Lee remembers being confused by the offer. Neither her mum or sister read magazines, so she had no concept of what a model was. She was a tomboy as teenager, and loved to play sports with the boys. Though fashion was not part of her world, she discovered an innate talent in front of the camera. Soon, she was walking runways for international luxury houses including Chanel, Gucci and Versace, starring in ad campaigns for YSL, Calvin Klein and Hugo Boss, and appearing on the covers of magazines around the world, including seven for Vogue Australia.

But over time, Lee realised that modelling was not her true passion and became frustrated with the restrictions of the job: being asked to embody someone else’s creative vision rather than her own. When she was 25, Lee was approached to audition for 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, director George Miller’s long-awaited fourth film in his Mad Max series. More than 1500 women vied for the roles of the five Wives of Immortan Joe. Lee had never acted before or even set foot on a film set. In her audition, she performed scenes from Network and Monty Python and told a story about how, as a child, she believed she was a mermaid. It was, she admits, a bizarre tape. But it worked. Lee was cast alongside Zoe Kravitz, Riley Keough, Courtney Eaton and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, and remembers landing in Namibia to make the movie and feeling an overwhelming sense that everything was as it should be.

Fury Road was wild and incredible and also deeply challenging. The work was demanding, the conditions gruelling, but at the same time, Lee was making lifelong friends with her co-stars and falling in love with the acting. For Lee, acting is the culmination of all the things she loves: painting, drawing, writing, music, performance. It is a unification of body, voice, mind and spirit. “There are all these elements of the arts that I love,” says Lee. “Acting for me is the mecca of all of them. Being an actor encompasses your whole being. It just makes sense to me.”

After Fury Road, Lee acted in films including Nicolas Winding Refn’s drama Neon Demon, the Australian comedy Ruben Guthrie, The Dark Tower and M. Night Shyamalan’s thriller Old, as well as in the critically acclaimed HBO limited series Lovecraft Country. When she wasn’t working, she threw herself into acting classes in both Los Angeles and New York, studying under Tony Greco, a proponent of the legendary Lee Strasberg’s method acting technique. Prior to her studies, Lee relied solely on her instincts as an actor, which she discovered on Fury Road were innate and true. But studies honed her craft. In 2022, on the set of her recent Netflix series Florida Man, Lee felt able to stretch her legs and use all the skills in her toolbox for the first time. The role was a turning point, with a New York magazine critic stating that her performance as the mercurial Delly “steals the show”.

Lee then secured a leading role in Horizon, Kevin Costner’s American Civil War epic. Costner offered the role directly to Lee, something that both excited and scared her, because it came with the expectation to deliver. She threw herself into her performance, which involved learning how to ride a horse – in a corset – alongside Costner, an avid equestrian. She is proud of the fact that she didn’t use a double for her riding scenes, that it’s really her up there, galloping through the mountains alongside Costner, who she says was endlessly supportive. The film premiered at Cannes Film Festival 2024 and recieved a 10 minute standing ovation.

Like Delly in Florida Man, Lee’s character in Horizon has a chaotic, extroverted energy. She says it’s fun to play those roles, because they’re in opposition to her own personality, which is more subdued. Right now, she’s looking for something more interior and quiet. She would love to work with Paul Thomas Anderson one day and is seeking out a female director she can collaborate with regularly throughout her career.

Next for Lee is Netflix forthcoming drama, Black Rabbit alongside Jason Bateman, Jude Law, Troy Cotsur and Odessa Young. Shot in New York City, Abbey is set to play “Anna” a formidable NYC bartender. Black Rabbit is set for release between Spring and Summer 2025.

Recently, Lee also returned to the runway after a 10-year hiatus, modelling selectively for luxury houses including Schiaparelli (she opened its autumn/winter 2023 show), Bottega Veneta, Versace and Saint Laurent. Lee has formed a close relationship with Saint Laurent designer Anthony Vaccarello, and was his personal guest at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival. In 2024 Abbey fronted multiple major campaigns for Italian fashion house, Gucci across beauty and accessories.

When not working, Lee retreats to London, where she is now based with her boyfriend and Honey, her beloved cane corso pitbull. She loves her life in London, loves being able to come home from an exhausting day on set, open the door and just be warm and cuddly and lazy for a little while. In her 20s, Lee wasn’t always able to switch off and rest, but it’s now a priority. She draws, takes Honey for long walks, spends time with fellow actor friends and goes to the theatre and the cinema every week. She is also obsessed with Pilates and owns her own reformer machine, which she jumps on every day.

But Lee misses Australia. She misses her family, she misses being able to walk around barefoot and most of all she misses the ocean. There’s something about the power and the purity of the sea in Australia that she hasn’t been able to find anywhere else. Diving into the ocean at home is like an energetic reset, she says. Whenever she comes back to Australia, that’s where you’ll find her.

ABBEY LEE

PORTFOLIO

COVERS

@abbeylee

PRESS

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