The Netflix series has given an air of racial diversity to Regency fiction and the Star Wars actor would be delighted to be a part of that.
Although many don’t know it because it was released to the general public in the latest ‘Star Wars’ trilogy, for those more attentive to indie cinema in ‘Attack the Block’ and for the most gourmets in ‘Detroit’ or the ‘Small Axe’ series, John Boyega is British. As a good British actor, the actor spent years studying drama in the UK, which means studying and working on the best classical performances, Shakespeare and beyond. Like so many others of African descent, he did so thinking that those types of historical roles would never come to him because of his skin, that he had better put on a hood and start working on the Detroit accent.
A series like ‘The Bridgertons’ has given hope to all those non-white interpreters that they can and should also participate in historical fictions of the country in which they were born, like any other. While he was talking to Meter Boyega was asked precisely why and if he would want to enter a fiction like ‘The Bridgertons’:
Oh absolutely! I would, I love the versatility. That’s what they taught us especially in drama school, they taught us about roles that wouldn’t necessarily come our way, but they still trained us to try and play them. So yeah, definitely, I would love to be in things that are more nuanced. After this period of doing Star Wars and having a pretty strict eight-year contract and being out of it, now I feel like a football player wondering ‘what team?’ I feel like I definitely have more room to do things that are different. Being in a big franchise is sometimes like a golden prison for an actor when he wants to do something else. Because remember, in a franchise you’re working on a character for many years, which can atrophy your other muscles a bit.
The second season of ‘The Bridgertons’ is now available on Netflix and its success has only confirmed that of the first. A third and a fourth are on the way so it gives us that John Boyega and many other interpreters will have the opportunity to walk through this picaresque revision of the Regency age.
Source: Fotogramas
Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
