Monica Bellucci chose to play Mary Magdalene in Mel Gibson’s 2004 film The Passion of the Christ despite her agent urging her not to take the part. The decision mattered because the project was then considered risky, with no confirmed distribution and uncertain commercial prospects, but it became a major international success.

Bellucci said she turned down a more conventional, commercial film because she felt drawn to Gibson’s project. The Passion of the Christ depicts the final hours of Jesus’s life and required Bellucci to sustain an emotionally demanding role; she described crying throughout much of the three-month shoot.