After graduating from Australia’s National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) in 1992, Blanchett immediately became a sensation in the Sydney theater scene. She won acclaim for her roles in Electra and Kafka Dances, becoming the first person to win both the Best Newcomer and Best Actress awards at the Sydney Theatre Critics’ Circle Awards in the same year (1993). She appeared in Australian series like Heartland and Bordertown, establishing a presence on screen before making the jump to feature films.

1997 was a pivotal year for Blanchett, as she starred in three distinct films that showcased her range. Her international film debut, Paradise Road, playing an Australian nurse in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp during WWII. Thank God He Met Lizzie, a romantic comedy that earned her an AFI Award for Best Supporting Actress. Starring opposite Ralph Fiennes in Oscar and Lucinda, this period drama proved she could carry a major production and caught the attention of Hollywood casting directors.

The final years of the decade saw Blanchett firmly established as a “prestige” actress capable of immense transformation. Her iconic performance as a young Queen Elizabeth I in Elizabeth (1998), which earned her a Golden Globe win, BAFTA, and first Oscar nomination. She also appeared in The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999).

By the end of the 1990s, Blanchett had developed a reputation for her ability to master complex accents (from Elizabethan English to New York Italian-American) became a trademark. She possessed a unique visual presence, ethereal yet commanding, which made her a favorite for both period dramas and contemporary fashion photography. She avoided “star vehicles” in favor of demanding, character-driven roles, a strategy that led directly to her becoming a mainstay of the 21st-century awards circuit.

Rabbits have high reproductive rates (females can produce multiple litters per year with 4–12 young each). With few natural predators, abundant food (grasses and crops), and suitable burrowing soil, their numbers exploded. By the mid-1860s, thousands were being shot on Austin’s property alone. They spread at up to 100 km per year. By the 1880s, they reached New South Wales and Queensland. By around 1910, they occupied most of southern and central Australia.

The rabbits caused severe ecological and economic damage. They devoured crops, pastures, and seedlings, leading to farm failures, soil erosion, and abandoned properties. They competed with sheep and cattle for food. Overgrazing stripped vegetation, causing erosion, loss of native plants, and habitat degradation. This harmed native wildlife (e.g., by reducing food and shelter for species like bilbies and bandicoots). They altered landscapes on a continental scale and contributed to the decline of native biodiversity.

Plagues were reported in various regions from the 1870s onward, with populations reaching hundreds of millions (estimates later peaked around 600 million before controls). Desperate colonial governments and farmers tried multiple strategies to halt the plague, though most had minimal impact.

By 1866, hunters had slaughtered 50,000 rabbits on Austin’s estate alone, yet the local breeding population outpaced the harvesting. Farmers deployed strychnine across properties to poison food and water sources, accidentally killing native wildlife. Settlers introduced European red foxes and feral cats to hunt the rabbits, but these predators chose to hunt easier native marsupials instead, worsening the biodiversity crisis. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, states built massive barriers, including the famous 1,700km rabbit-proof fence in Western Australia, but rabbits breached them before completion.

Major success came later with biological controls: the myxomatosis virus in the 1950s (which initially killed ~99% of rabbits) and later the calicivirus (RHDV).

The rabbit invasion remains a classic cautionary tale about invasive species. Australia still manages feral rabbits (numbers are much lower than peak but still problematic), and the event highlights how a small introduction in a naive ecosystem can have catastrophic, long-lasting effects. Thomas Austin is often blamed, though he was just one of many who introduced animals for “acclimatisation.”