Charlize Theron Details an Embarrassing First Audition: 'I Poured the Whole Bottle of Ketchup on My Stomach'

Charlize Theron takes the cover of the V Magazine #101.

Here’s what the 40-year-old actress had to share with the mag:

On an embarrassing first audition: “I tried to make it like acting class, where you would try and make it as real as possible. You’d bring in props and things like that. I had to do this scene where I, in the movie, show up at this house where I know James Spader’s character is about to do this hit. I show up because I’ve just been shot. I need him to get me to the hospital. I’m bleeding from my stomach. It’s basically moments before I die. I came into the auditioning room, and when they said, “Okay, are you ready?” I went out the door and in my bag I had brought this bottle of ketchup. I poured the whole bottle of ketchup on my stomach, then told the receptionist outside, “Look, it’s going to get a little loud.” I warned her because I noticed she was on the phone, like that was my job or something. Then I barged through the door, getting ketchup on all the doors and the furniture. I just didn’t know how not to try and make it as real as possible. I think they were a little more concerned about my own sanity. Eventually they gave me the role. [Director John Herzfeld] said, ‘I knew you’d be up for anything.’”

On her rough relationship with Tobey Maguire in Cider House Rules: “Tobey and I had a bit of a rough time, yeah. I mean, we’re good now. It was a difficult movie. Every day is completely different for a completely different reason. Whether it’s the weather, or the writing isn’t there, or you don’t get along with your castmate, you have to be able to go to something else that’s just as powerful. Does it make it as enjoyable? Probably not. I mean, there were just a couple of days that Tobey and I had a rough time. The rest of the movie, we actually had a really good time. I love Tobey. I’m kind of glad we had that experience on that movie. It teaches you different things. It taught me that I could fall in love with somebody in my head while looking at someone else. We had some really intimate moments. Tobey and I didn’t feel that way about each other, so I had to figure something else out.”

On women in Hollywood: “It’s brutal when you think of the truth of what we face in society, what it means for a woman versus what it means for a man. What we, especially women, consider to be our strengths and to be our weaknesses. That aging is a weakness that we think of it that way. Yet, it’s when we’re at our wisest. We’ve experienced everything and we should be considering ourselves the richest. We live in a society where women are treated like wilted flowers. They used to be pretty, but now they’re just kind of wilting. The guy is like a fine bottle of wine. He just gets better and better with age. It became very real, the vanity of it all. That we are all animals of our circumstance. If you are raised to believe that your power is only good for as long as you’re beautiful, then that’s what you’re going to believe.”

For more from Charlize, visit V magazine.