Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot looked miles away from her sleek movie star image as she competed in Miss Universe back in 2004.
Gal Gadot is now a household name thanks to her role as Wonder Woman and her status as a bona fide movie star.
However, like so many other screen sirens, the 38-year-old has a background in beauty pageants and represented her country, Israel, in the Miss Universe competition in 2004.
Looking a million miles away from the polished star that we now know, she sports far shorter wet look curly hair.
While her natural beauty still shines through, her make-up is far heavier and less sleek than the look she favours nowadays.
The look appears to have been a deliberate choice though as the mum-of-three confessed in 2017 that she actually had no desire to win the contest.
She admitted to Rolling Stone that her mother and a friend actually entered her in the Miss Israel competition, in the few months she had off between graduating from high school and serving her two mandatory years in the Israel Defence Forces.
When she found out she’d made the cut for the competition she initially embraced it.
“I told myself, ‘I’m just gonna do this. They’re gonna fly us to Europe, and I’m gonna get to tell my grandchildren that Grandmom did the Miss Israel thing.’ Little did I know that I would win.”
She also didn’t realise that winning meant she would have to take part in the Miss Universe pageant, which was not something she had any interest in.
“I knew that I did not want to win Miss Universe. It wasn’t my thing.
“For an 18-year-old, it looked like too much responsibility,” she told the title.
So, in a move that could have come straight out of a big-screen comedy, she decided to sabotage her chances deliberately wearing the wrong things and pretending she didn’t speak English.
Despite now being considered one of the most beautiful women in the world, she didn’t even make the top 20. “I lost majorly,” she said. “I victoriously lost.”
The pageant world’s loss was Hollywood’s gain and following her breakthrough role in Fast and Furious in 2009, she was cast as Wonder Woman and has enjoyed stellar success ever since.
Her latest movie Heart of Stone lands on Netflix today and sees her take on another action role as Rachel Stone, a CIA agent with big secrets.
