Discerning moviegoers of both genders are probably down with the idea of Scarlet Johansson playing a pilates instructor and would-be singer who has an affair with a married guy in Ken Kwapis‘s He’s Just Not That Into You, and the jelly-bellied fanboys will most likely want to catch her as an enticingly-clad femme fatale in Frank Miller‘s The Spirit (technical title: Will Eisner’s The Spirit).
But however The Other Boleyn Girl and Mary, Queen of Scots turn out as films, the odds are that Johansson will not be regarded as a radiant asset in either one. To play powerful period women you need that RADA (Royal Acdademy of Dramatic Arts) thing going on, and Johansson is absolutely lacking that pedigree. Period pieces work against her natural chemical leanings, or vice versa. The Girl in the Pearl Earring was all about her slightly parted lips, and nobody I know bought her in The Black Dahlia or The Prestige.
