Zoë Kravitz is riding high after her latest film, The Batman, soared at the box office this weekend, but the road to get here wasn’t easy. She’s been trying to nab a role in the Batman franchise for quite a while — and one of her attempts was downright disheartening.
A decade ago, she wanted to audition for Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, but her attempts were thwarted before she even stepped into the room. According to The Guardian, the message being handed down to her was that she was too “urban” for the role she desired. While she didn’t think it was Nolan who passed along the racist feedback to her agent, Kravitz believes it was “probably a casting director of some kind, or a casting director’s assistant” who delivered the message in a very inappropriate way.
Take a look back at every live-action Catwoman since 1966, from Julie Newmar all the way up to Zoë Kravitz. Let us know if you think any of these were purr-fect casting choices. https://t.co/rkjRaW2nMY
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“Being a woman of colour and being an actor and being told at that time that I wasn’t able to read because of the colour of my skin, and the word urban being thrown around like that, that was what was really hard about that moment,” she added. Anne Hathaway played Catwoman in that movie, but Kravitz made it clear in a 2015 Nylon interview that she was going for a smaller role in the film. Even so, the casting news for The Batman must have been a victorious day for the 33-year-old actress because it is such an iconic role — and one that takes her career to the next level.
With The Batman earning a whopping $128.5 million this weekend, according to Box Office Mojo, Kravitz likely has Hollywood clamoring to book her on their next film. It’s a far cry from her 2012 missed audition, but it’s a reality check that racism is still an hot-topic issue in the entertainment industry.
Before you go, click here to see celebrity women of color share the first movie or TV character who made them feel seen.
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