Leslye Headland Reveals Key Influences for ‘The Acolyte’, Talks Casting and Plans for the Future
Only a couple days have gone by since The Acolyte received its first trailer, and promotion for the series has begun in full. We now know that it will premiere its first two episodes on June 4, and certain theaters that play The Phantom Menace in May will show additional footage of the upcoming series then.
As The Acolyte‘s premiere draws closer, showrunner Leslye Headland has begun doing more interviews for the series. IGN recently had the chance to speak with her about her main inspirations for the show, how she selected its impressive cast, and how The Acolyte‘s story will impact the saga going forward.
Headland kicked things off by discussing which previous Star Wars projects inspired her show and where those influences are most apparent:
“Obviously a lot of our Coruscant stuff is prequel-based. It was a challenge but we wanted to utilize practical sets for Coruscant and that meditation room that you see, we wanted to do it justice but also have it feel real and tactile. Definitely the large amount of Jedi you see in the trailer I think is very reminiscent of the Prequel Trilogy, though we don’t have any Attack of the Clones-level scenes…
“But also, The Clone Wars [inspired The Acolyte], a lot being inspired by Nightsisters. We don’t have any Nightsisters in this show, but being inspired by them, being inspired by Asajj Ventress. My favorite episode is The Wrong Jedi. I definitely took some inspiration from that.
“We kind of ran the gambit: ‘Let’s reference Return of the Jedi here, let’s reference this holding cell based on a Clone Wars episode here, let’s have a Cantina,’ because I’ve always wanted one. I think when you get an opportunity to do a Star Wars and you’re a Star Wars fan, the idea is to get in a lot of your wish list. And hopefully other people are excited by it too.”
The High Republic era has been going strong in novels and comics for about four years now, and The Acolyte represents its first venture into the live-action space. Given that this branch of Star Wars storytelling has involved collaboration amongst a multitude of writers and artists, it’s only natural that some fans may wonder if we’ll see story elements from The Acolyte later continued elsewhere. As Headland puts it, that may well be the case:
“I think there’s absolutely room for it to grow. I think that especially nowadays…I’m just the kind of person where I want to make sure a season feels like a legitimately whole story, and I definitely pepper in a lot of like, ‘Here’s how it could go this way, it could go that way.’
“I also don’t want to leave the audience hanging emotionally. I want to leave them hanging narratively but emotionally, I want them to feel like they’ve watched a whole thing, and then still have a bunch of questions at the end like, ‘Wait, now that I’ve learned this relationship exists, what’s going to happen with those people, and now that this person has this type of power, what are we going to do about that?’ So I think it can definitely have some of that.”
A quick glance at the cast list for The Acolyte reveals that the series boasts some remarkable talent in front of the camera. Acclaimed actors like Lee Jung-jae, Amandla Stenberg, Carrie-Anne Moss, and many others will have major roles in the show. The cast is also noteworthy for its immense diversity. When asked if diversity was a goal during the casting process, Headland has this to say:
“I think with the cast, honestly they were just all the people that I wanted. I saw Squid Game, and I had written this character, and I had no idea who to cast, and I had no idea who was going to be able to play all of these different levels and then I thought [about] Squid Game and I was like, ‘that’s the guy, that’s him. I don’t know how I get in touch with this person, I don’t know if they want to perform in English.’ To me, it became so clearly [Lee Jung-jae’s] part, as opposed to [casting him for] the fact he’s a Korean movie star. And then when I worked with him I was like, ‘this is the best actor I’ve ever worked with.’…
“And then, somebody like Dafne Keen, I’d loved so much in Logan that, I wrote this character, and I was like, ‘you know what would be great, I’d love to see X-23 with a lightsaber. How do we make that happen?’
“So, that’s what I would say about the diversity of the cast. Mostly they were people that were essentially my first choice. I wrote this part that Charlie Barnett played, who I worked with on Russian Doll. This doesn’t give too much away about the character, but he’s such an A+ student. He’s like, an A+ Jedi. And that’s Charlie in real life. He’s such a good actor, and he just wants to be really good. So when it came time to casting that character, you know who would be just perfect is Charlie. I’ve seen him just do whatever it takes to get the scene.”
It’s always interesting to hear creators who work on Star Wars projects discuss which earlier stories, both within the beloved galaxy and outside it, inspired their take on the mythos. That’s especially true for a show like The Acolyte, which will be many viewers’ first experience with a High Republic-set story. Based on the show’s record-breaking initial trailer, a lot of fans are eager to see what Headland and her team have prepared.
For the full interview, you can go to IGN.
Eric has been a fan of Star Wars ever since the age of five (or so) when his parents sat him down in front of a TV with pizza and a Sprite and showed him the original trilogy. He keeps trying to convince more fans to read the amazing 1980s Star Wars newspaper comics by Archie Goodwin and Al Williamson. When he's not reading, watching or playing Star Wars media, he's often enjoying other great fantasy and science fiction sagas or playing roleplaying games with his friends.
