Samantha Morton says Hollywood ageism has left her without an acting job for a year, even as her performance as Circe in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey earns some of the film’s strongest reviews. It is a striking contrast: a major role in a global blockbuster, followed by no publicly announced follow-up work.
Speaking on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, the 49-year-old British actor said industry politics and the limited opportunities available to women her age had affected her career.
“I haven’t worked for a year since making The Odyssey, you know, and I’ve got really good agents and a manager, but at the end of the day, I’m 49,” Morton said.
“I do believe I’m a good actor, [but] there are other good actors out there. Do you know what I mean? So, the politics of the industry has changed massively.”
Why The Odyssey felt like a career rebirth
Filming on The Odyssey wrapped in August 2025. Morton said landing the role mattered beyond simply remaining employed because it allowed her to work with Nolan, a filmmaker she had long hoped to meet.
“I genuinely cried when I got the call from my team saying, ‘Christopher Nolan would like to meet you,’” she said.
Morton described the experience as proof that sustained work can eventually reach the right people, even when the business remains unpredictable.
“Hope and faith that I suppose if you keep at it, and you keep producing good work and the right people see it, then maybe you can carry onward,” she said.
She also sounded at peace with what the production represented. “For me it’s more I got to work with Christopher Nolan in my lifetime,” she said. “That’s it. I’m happy now.”
NME previously reported that Morton called the role a career “rebirth,” one that could introduce her to audiences beyond the independent films and television projects that have defined much of her career. She also said at the time that she “still work[s] all the time.” That comment sits somewhat awkwardly beside her later account of a year without work, but no acting role filmed after The Odyssey has been publicly announced.
How Morton made Circe deliberately ageless
Morton plays Circe, the sorcerer encountered by Odysseus during his long journey home. She told the Los Angeles Times that she approached the character as several ages at once: “a 16-year-old girl,” a 49-year-old and a 90-year-old. The intention was to make Circe feel ageless rather than place her within one tidy casting category.
That choice has become particularly relevant given Morton’s comments about age. The role asks audiences to see a woman as ancient, youthful and middle-aged simultaneously. Hollywood’s employment system, by comparison, tends to prefer a box with a clearly printed number on it.
ABC reported that Morton’s Circe sequence received a standing ovation on set, reportedly Nolan’s first since Heath Ledger’s performance in The Dark Knight. Morton separately told Vanity Fair that making the film felt like a “religious” experience.
Critics largely agreed that the result stood out in an ensemble featuring Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Tom Holland, Zendaya, Lupita Nyong’o and Charlize Theron. Variety called Morton’s work the film’s “most indelible performance,” while RogerEbert.com described it as the movie’s scariest. The New Yorker was more restrained, writing that she “almost sells” Nolan’s substantial revision of Circe.
The blockbuster success has not produced another role
Morton’s comments have gained extra weight as The Odyssey has grown into one of the year’s largest commercial releases. The Associated Press reported on August 3 that the film had earned $911.4 million worldwide, including $395.5 million in North America.
That makes the situation unusually clear. Morton delivered one of the most discussed performances in a star-heavy film approaching $1 billion at the box office, yet says she has not worked since production ended. Critical praise, commercial success and an elite director apparently do not guarantee that the next script arrives.
The actor remains confident that her career will continue through its familiar fluctuations. She said she expects to keep working into her 80s. Her concern is not that her career is over, but that age increasingly shapes which opportunities reach her in the first place.
What the industry data says about women over 45
Recent research supports Morton’s broader argument. The University of Southern California’s Annenberg Inclusion Initiative examined the 100 highest-grossing films of 2025 and found a substantial gender gap among older leading performers.
- Only four films had a solo female lead or co-lead aged 45 or older.
- Thirty films featured a male lead or co-lead in the same age group.
- None featured a woman of color over 45 in a leading or co-leading role.
San Diego State University separately found that women represented 29% of protagonists in 2025’s top-grossing films, down from 42% in 2024. Female characters were concentrated in their 20s and 30s, while male characters more often appeared in their 30s and 40s.
Morton’s own career makes the gap difficult to explain as a question of experience. She has worked on screen since the 1990s and has collaborated with directors including Steven Spielberg and Woody Allen. She won a Golden Globe in 2007 for Longford and received the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Fellowship in 2024 for her contribution to film and television.
She also received Academy Award nominations for her performances in 1999’s Sweet and Lowdown and 2002’s In America. The résumé is established. The reviews are strong. The latest film is a major financial success. According to Morton, the obstacle left on the table is her age, which is less a plot twist than an industry pattern with numbers behind it.
