How To Thrive

BRYCE DALLAS HOWARD IS BACK STANDING UP TO DINOSAURS ONSCREEN AND FOR WHAT SHE’S WORTH IN REAL LIFE. 

- Tiffany Blackstone

2015’s Jurassic World is the fourth-highest-grossing movie of all time ($1,6-billion, about R19,8-billion) – and half of a metaphor about a mindset shift that has taken place in Bryce Dallas Howard and our culture in the last couple of years. Her character, Claire, a hard-nosed corporate type, spends two hours dashing around the jungle in heels. Though Claire was not the first movie heroine made to do what her male counterpart does but backward and in unrealistic footwear, the movie was released just a few months after the #AskHerMore campaign swept Twitter and awards-season red carpets. The backlash was swift and loud.

‘I never thought there would be this whole hoopla, because she worked in an office,’ says Bryce. ‘It seemed logical that she wouldn’t be prepared to be out in the jungle.’

Still, the boots Claire wears in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom – which hits theatres this month, just a few short months after the Time’s Up movement was launched – were a revelation for Bryce: ‘The first film for me was so much more challenging, but I didn’t realise it until I had boots on! Claire’s a girl who can totally sprint in heels, but maximum effort in boots is much easier.’ As for herself, Bryce says, ‘I can do it, but do I want to?’ More importantly: Why should she have to?