Jennifer Beals Discusses ‘The Book of Boba Fett’ and How Dave Filoni Helped Her Get Into Character
In a new interview with Variety, actress Jennifer Beals gave a few details about the making of The Book of Boba Fett and discussed her experience with Star Wars. Beals’ involvement with the show had remained a secret until the debut of the trailer in early November. Not much else is known at the moment, besides the fact that she’s playing a Twi’lek (see picture above).
But before her involvement in The Book of Boba Fett, Beals was not precisely the biggest Star Wars fan. As she told Variety, she was definitely familiar with the franchise, but mostly because of her experience watching it as a kid:
“It’s not as if I’m well versed in ‘Star Wars’ lore at all. But that moment when Luke is instructed to use the Force identified for me my beginnings of my understanding of the universe, in a way, as a young woman. I thought to myself, ‘Oh, yes, that’s, that’s what this thing is this, this energy that, that I will feel sometimes if I’m in the forest or I’m focusing.’ It was just the first time that was identified for me. So, to be part of that — I never even imagined that it would be possible for me to be in the ‘Star Wars’ family. I get really excited still.”
Despite that, the last movie she saw before the lockdown was The Rise of Skywalker. At the time, though, she wasn’t even aware of The Mandalorian, as she said:
“As it happened, I didn’t know about ‘The Mandalorian’ really, either. My older brother called me and said, ‘I’m going to go watch “The Mandalorian” with [my] kids.’ And I said, ‘Oh, tell me about “The Mandalorian,”‘ and he started telling me about the show and how great it was. And I walked into the house and the phone rang and that was the offer [for ‘The Book of Boba Fett’]. So that night, I started watching. I was just gobsmacked. It just was so beautiful with so cinematic and heart-centered at the same time.”
She then described the first moment she walked into the set, and apparently, she had a similar experience to Ming-Na Wen’s — she didn’t even know they were filming The Book of Boba Fett, just that she was now a part of the Mandalorian family:
“Are you kidding me? I mean, I knew about the character. But this is how good they are at the lockdown of secrets: Even when I first stepped onto the set, I didn’t realize that I was in ‘The Book of Boba Fett.’ I just knew that I was getting to be part of this story.”
As mentioned earlier, her character is a Twi’lek, a species she didn’t know much about at first:
“I had to be reminded of what that was and who they are and where they’re from. Dave Filoni is just extraordinary. He’s like a walking encyclopedia. Instead of relying on the internet — which, you know, I don’t know who the authors are of certain articles that I’m looking at — I would go to the source. I would go to Dave, and we would talk about character and how is this person different perhaps than the lineage that’s come before, and what has informed her experiences and then how does that change the way she looks or behaves — or dresses for that matter.”
The main look of the character (like every Twi’lek) is of course given by the lekku, the two long appendages on her head. They were apparently not that heavy and easy to take off when needed, as she said:
“The team really went to the ends of the earth to make sure that not only were they incredibly light, but that they were balanced perfectly for my skull. They were easy to keep on during the day. We could take them off during during a break if I needed one. But [wearing them] just changes everything. It’s like this incredible crown of sensitivity and identity.”
Beals was also asked if her character had anything to do with Bib Fortuna, the other main Twi’lek in the Star Wars films, who was killed off in the Mandalorian Season 2 finale. However, the actress deflected the question. She did say, though, that it is not unreasonable to think that her character is someone of stature, given the seemingly expensive clothing she is wearing in the trailers:
“I think that’s fair that I say that to you. What am I gonna do, go, ‘Oh, I don’t know, is she?'”
Lastly, Variety brought up the fact that she might end up having a toy made after her character. Beals was sort of excited about this, though she didn’t want to overthink it, in case she was let down in the end:
“I don’t know that I get one? Who knows. We’ll see! We did do that incredible room where they have hundreds of cameras all around you taking your picture so that they can make the action figure. But I don’t know. Who knows if they’ll decide to do it. They I think they say that to all the girls.”
We’ll certainly learn more about her character as The Book of Boba Fett starts airing its episodes on Disney Plus, on December 29.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as movies from Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
