Charlotte Kirk on Hollywood: ‘I trusted a lot of people, and the wrong people, and I shouldn’t have’

Charlotte Kirk on navigating Hollywood, Digi Mart USA News: After a run of roles as an assassin, a serial killer and a gangster, British actor Charlotte Kirk went looking for something lighter. In Christmas & Chaos, she plays Sadie, a pop star trying to write three hits for a new musical by an impresario, played by Jason Isaacs, who appears only via video call.

Kirk also produced the film, which she approached director Jamie Adams to make. Adams is known for several low-budget British films, including Black Mountain Poets, and his regular use of improvisation intrigued her.

The pair worked out the story together but made the film without a script.

Kirk has built a career largely defined by genre films, often working with director Neil Marshall, known for Hellboy and The Descent. Their films include the 17th-century horror The Reckoning, the Alien-influenced The Lair and the erotic thriller Compulsion.

They were engaged for a while and continue to work together, often as co-writers.

Kirk moved to the US at 18, believing she would find more opportunities than in the British film and TV industry. She says she was naive about whom to trust.

“I trusted a lot of people, and the wrong people, and I shouldn’t have,” she said.

Kirk is also bound by at least two non-disclosure agreements tied to a scandal involving allegations of sexual harassment and extortion. She declined to discuss the details.

Publicly available information suggests the scandal involves some of the most powerful men in the business, who have denied wrongdoing and describe any relationship with Kirk as consensual. Kirk has sought to have one NDA, signed in 2017, lifted under a California law limiting NDAs in harassment cases.

To retain control over her career, Kirk now produces much of her own work, making two films a year through her production company. She recently finished The Spiral Down with Marshall, who wrote and produced it, and hopes for a sequel to their 2024 crime film Duchess.