Evangeline Lilly wanted to play Leia in Star Wars trilogy
The actress says she loves playing The Wasp, but has dreams of an all-female Avengers movie.
- Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year" award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
Evangeline Lilly, seen here as The Wasp, dreamed of another movie role.
Star Wars fans likely can't envision anyone but the late Carrie Fisher as Princess (later General) Leia Organa. But before it was known that Fisher would return for 2015's The Force Awakens and 2017's The Last Jedi, another actress was interested.
Evangeline Lilly, who stars in Marvel's Ant-Man and The Wasp, said she had Force-ful dreams.
"When JJ (Abrams) announced that he was gonna do his first Star Wars film, I reached out to his producing partner for the first time ever since (ABC plane-crash drama) Lost ended," Lilly said at Fan Expo Boston this weekend. "I never requested anything ever before, and I said, 'I wanna be Leia! Make me Leia!'"
That obviously didn't work out, but Lilly told the crowd she's delighted to play The Wasp. And she's not that interested in The Wasp getting her own film apart from Ant-Man -- except under one circumstance.
"I love the team aspect of it," she said. "I love watching the interplay between Wasp and Ant-Man and Ant-Man and The Wasp. For me it's the most fun part of the film. So I don't love the idea of breaking them up -- except if there was an all-female Avengers film. Then I'm in."
While there's no all-female Avengers movie on Marvel's calendar, Brie Larson will star in Captain Marvel in March, the studio's first film headed by a female superhero.
