As a producer and lead actress on Barbie, Margot Robbie is arguably having one of the biggest summers of her career. As for Robbie’s character in real-life, well, the star revealed on CBS Sunday Morning that paying off her mom Sarie Kessler’s house mortgage was a top priority once she was able to do so. It was a surprise gesture to her mom, but an obvious choice for Robbie.
“Everything I owed my mom, I had it written down,” Robbie said, via People. “She’d take money out of the, like, house mortgage [to] lend me money. So I always knew, I was like, ‘I gotta pay that back.’ And then one day, when I made enough money, I just paid that whole mortgage off completely.
“I was like, ‘Mom, don’t even worry about that mortgage anymore. It doesn’t even exist anymore.’ Honestly, anyone in my position, you’d do that for your mom. Of course you would.”
Robbie with her mother at the Babylon premiere.
Kessler interviewed Robbie for Vogue Australia in 2019, admitting that when Robbie told her that she wanted to be an actress at age 12, she was skeptical.
“I thought that it’s hard to be an actor and make a good living,” Kessler said at the time. “But I was very concerned you were intending to take a pathway that, to me, didn’t have a really extensive future. And now you could say: ‘Mum, you needed more faith in what I can achieve.’ I’m just absolutely so happy for you that you’re in a situation where you love what you do and you have the independence to do what you do because you guys started up your own company [LuckyChap, where Robbie produces films].”
Robbie told Kessler in that same interview that she spent her first paycheck “on paying you back, mum. Don’t you remember?”
“No, I do–that would be right,” Kessler responded.
“I was so in debt by the end of grade 12,” Robbie told the outlet. “I had everything I owed you written on a piece of paper and every time I got a pay[check], I paid off my debt, but then I kept the piece of paper, because it was so satisfying at the end to know I’d paid it all back. And then I started saving. And then I probably started going out and I don’t know … went to the movies.”
Senior News and Strategy Editor
Alyssa Bailey is the senior news and strategy editor at ELLE.com, where she oversees coverage of celebrities and royals (particularly Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton). She previously held positions at InStyle and Cosmopolitan. When she’s not working, she loves running around Central Park, making people take #ootd pics of her, and exploring New York City.