Anya Taylor-Joy expresses her excitement to be working with George Miller on the Mad Max: Fury Road prequel, Furiosa, in a new interview. George Miller's action-packed franchise has been one of the most celebrated of the genre since getting underway with the Mel Gibson-led 1979 debut installment. After spending years in development hell due to financial issues, Miller finally revived the series with 2015's Fury Road, which received the highest reviews and box office returns of the four films and renewed audience interest in the post-apocalyptic universe.
Despite this success and plans for multiple follow-ups, the franchise has had a rocky road in the following years due to a financial lawsuit between Miller's production label and Warner Bros. Following the settlement of the suit, development got back on track, beginning with Furiosa, as Miller quickly began scouting and casting the film, including Taylor-Joy in the titular role alongside Chris Hemsworth and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II. With the start of production coming up, Taylor-Joy is opening up about her work on the highly-anticipated film.
In the latest installment of Variety's Actors on Actors series, Taylor-Joy chatted with her Emma co-star Josh O'Connor about working on the Fury Road prequel. In addition to discussing her Spanish-speaking father's teasing over Furiosa's name, the Golden Globe winner opened up about her excitement to be working with Miller on the project. Read what Taylor-Joy had to say below:
“The thing that makes me most excited about Furiosa is, No. 1, George Miller. That brain is incredible. I feel so lucky and privileged to spend time with him, and to grow alongside him. I’m also really excited to do something physical. To physically become something else is something that will weirdly give me a lot of peace. I’m quite excited to work hard. My dad gives me a lot of hell because we speak Spanish, he calls her, ‘Furiosa’ [with a pronounced accent]. And I’m like, it’s an English-speaking film. But, like, ‘OK Daddy.’ I’ve got a grace period until August, and then I will be working back-to-back until mid-2023.”
Though Taylor-Joy has received plenty of attention for her roles in Netflix's The Queen's Gambit and indie horror pic The Witch, Miller's Furiosa will mark the biggest production to date for the actress after the flop of The New Mutants and it couldn't be a better project for her. Across his 50-year career, Miller has made the rare distinction of only having one critical disappointment on his resume and Fury Road was one of the biggest surprise successes of them all. With the previous film not only coming 30 years prior but also alienating some fans, the notion of bringing the franchise back for a fourth installment with a new actor was questionable, and yet it became one of the greatest films the action genre has ever seen.
Taylor-Joy may be keeping properly mum on what will be coming from Furiosa, but her comments regarding the brilliant nature of Miller's work and the physicality required for the film are very promising. Miller's shift in actors once again from Charlize Theron to Taylor-Joy may be putting some in doubt, but given how well the transition from Gibson to Tom Hardy worked in Fury Road, it should be exciting for audiences to see what Taylor-Joy does with the role. With production slated to begin in August and the film slated for a 2023 release, there will be some time before the beans are spilled on the long-awaited prequel.
Source: Variety
