RACHAEL TAYLOR | Transformers

Rachael Taylor

'I've been so lucky' - Rachael Transforming her career

AUSSIE starlet Rachael Taylor led a stellar cast, including Josh Duhamel, Jon Voigt and newcomer Shia Labeouf at the action film's glitzy LA launch.

The star's walked the web carpet talking to fans and autograph seekers at the premiere.

Taylor, who wowed the crowds in a floor-length cobalt blue gown fit right in with the Hollywood crowd.

The star of axed Seven series, Headlands has revealed she is excited about her lucky break.

The Australian star says she marvelled at being part of a big screen spectacular.

"Being part of hundreds of millions of dollars of work and working with (director) Michael Bay and (producer) Steven Spielberg has certainly been a ride," the Tasmanian-raised actress says of the $145 million film.

"It's an extraordinary piece of work in every sense. It is a big Hollywood blockbuster and to be part of it in any way has been fantastic. It's like a dream."

Struggling Australian actors make the pilgrimage to Los Angeles every year, determined to launch their international careers. Some can spend up to a decade plugging away before landing their break- out role.

Taylor had no such problem.

In the 12 months since she left Sydney, she has featured as computer data analyst Maggie in Transformers and secured her first leading role opposite Dawson's Creek star Joshua Jackson in the psychological thriller Shutter.

"I never expected to do a big action movie when I went to Los Angeles, I expected to spend the next 10 years waiting tables," says Taylor on a recent trip home to promote Transformers.

In the film her character Maggie's skills are put to the test by the US government when Earth is invaded by robotic aliens.

"I have been extremely lucky to go over to Hollywood and do exactly what I have always wanted to do and it's mind-blowing," she says.

"It's all been about getting up, doing your job and sort of keeping your head screwed on straight at the same time."

The striking blonde first rose to prominence as feisty vixen Sasha Forbes on doomed Seven network program Headland. The soap made its debut in December 2005 and by the end of January had been given its marching orders. Despite its demise, Taylor says it prepared her for the fast-paced filmmaking world Bay immerses himself in.

"I would never have been ready to work on Transformers if I hadn't worked on Headland," Taylor says matter-of-factly. "Shooting a television show for a year was such good grounding and good training for me. You have to work hard and fast in television and Michael Bay shoots really fast, so I am grateful that I had a year cutting my teeth on something I am really proud of."

In Transformers Taylor shares the screen with rising US actors Shia La Beouf and Megan Fox, as well as Oscar-winner Jon Voight, the father of Angelina Jolie.

Taylor says the prospect of working alongside Voight was exciting but daunting.

"At first I was a little bit intimidated by Jon Voight because he's Jon Voight, but he's so generous and funny and quirky and was so invested in making films still," she says.

"He's not too cool. It's not like he's done it all and seen it all. He's still really committed to making good movies and making the scene work. He would write notes all over his script and then give them to me and ask me what I thought. I have been really lucky to work with people that I have learned so much from."

After Transformers Taylor embarked on a three-month filming mission in Tokyo for Shutter. The storyline was intense, forcing Taylor to dig deep for the role.

"I used to be a huge Pacey fan ... I adore Joshua," she grins about Jackson's character on Dawson's Creek, which also starred Tom Cruise's wife Katie Holmes and Heath Ledger's partner Michelle Williams.

"Shutter really, really stretched me as an actress. It was a great learning curve."

Relocating to Tokyo for the duration of filming also took its toll. "It was very intense because Tokyo is such an intense environment," she admits. "It's very compressed and very chaotic; I was very much an outsider there."

While she'd love to party up a storm at the night spots Paris Hilton, Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan frequent in Hollywood, Taylor says she's not sure she fits that mould.

"I would love to go to some of those parties, but I can't get on the list," she jokes. "At the end of the day you are who you are and I am just not a Hollywood girl. I am from Tasmania and keep it fairly simple. I don't go out that much and I am just never going to be part of that LA cool crowd. I would love to try and participate, but I am sure I would do a disastrous job of it."

Taylor says she will stick it out in LA for a while longer but constantly misses the securities of home – Tim Tams, Vegemite, Cadbury's chocolate and of course her family.

"I am very homesick," she says. "But as much as I miss Sydney I have been a lucky girl and I want to stay a bit longer."

* Transformers opens today

By Erin McWhirter June 28, 2007

Source: News