Keira Knightley became a global superstar almost overnight thanks to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. The movies were massive hits that made Knightley a household name. Except for a brief cameo in the most recent Pirates film, she’s stayed away from franchise movies in general since completing the initial trilogy. Today, the actress says she’s never going back to making movies like that.
Kiera Knightley clearly has a love/hate relationship with the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Speaking with The Times, she admits that the movies opened doors for her, but she also says that she was looked down on in the industry because of her involvement in the blockbuster films. Knightley explained…
It’s a funny thing when you have something that was making and breaking you at the same time. I was seen as shit because of them, and yet because they did so well I was given the opportunity to do the films that I ended up getting Oscar nominations for. They were the most successful films I’ll ever be a part of and they were the reason that I was taken down publicly. So they’re a very confused place in my head.
Knightley has previously talked about the difficult place the Pirates movies put her in, with her character, being the “object of everyone’s lust.” The films made her a celebrity and launched her career, a career that would eventually lead to Oscar nominations and numerous other accolades. They also put her in the public eye, which resulted in a lot of critical reporting, including accusations of an eating disorder.
Despite Keira Knightley’s success in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, which she honestly thought would bomb, she is one of those actors who has yet to appear in a major superhero movie or other modern franchise. In an era when it seems that every actor is going to be in the MCU eventually, there are no signs that she will. That is likely all due to her choices because she says following the Pirates movies, she simply has no desire to be involved in that sort of project again. According to Knightley…
The hours are insane. It’s years of your life, you have no control over where you’re filming, how long you’re filming, what you’re filming.
The future of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise still has a lot of questions, as we don’t know who will be in it or what it will be about. Even Johnny Depp’s participation, which seemed sure to not happen, is now in some doubt. But it seems we can pretty definitively say that Keira Knightley won’t be back. Not all her memories of them are good and she has no interest to go back.