Anya Taylor-Joy compares Furiosa and Princess Peach from Mario: 'The craziest situation ever'
Even Anya Taylor-Joy was surprised to find the commonalities between two seemingly disparate characters she plays on screen: Furiosa of the Mad Max films and Princess Peach of The Super Mario Bros. Movie. But find them she did.
In an interview with her Mario cast mates Chris Pratt, Charlie Day, Jack Black, and Keegan-Michael Key for EW's Around the Table, the actress discussed filming the Furiosa prequel film with director George Miller and going right into recording voiceover for Peach, who rides a motorcycle in a Mario Kart-inspired sequence in The Super Mario Bros. Movie.
"The fact that I was shooting Furiosa and riding motorcycles, and then going in and doing this was the craziest situation ever," Taylor-Joy says. "These two characters have nothing technically to do with each other, and yet!" She then points to an image close by of Peach on her cycle.
The Mario movie sees two New York plumbing brothers, Mario (Pratt) and Luigi (Day), sucked through a portal and dropped into a fantasy land where Princess Peach of the Mushroom Kingdom is trying to prevent Bowser (Black) from taking over.
"When I was first approached about playing Princess Peach, I was super excited, super honored, and also slightly terrified because I only wanted to play her if she was a 3D character, if she had her own agency, and also she's not just a princess, she's a leader," Taylor-Joy says.
"I'm so glad that everybody at Nintendo and Illumination, and the directors were up for that," she adds, "because I don't think I would've done it otherwise. And we've had so much fun bringing Peach to life. And what I was not expecting was how much of an emotional reaction I would've had to seeing the film because the idea that kids are going to grow up with this being the example of what a princess is just feels very cool and very inspiring."
Taylor-Joy also stars as a younger version of Charlize Theron's character from Mad Max: Fury Road in a film that chronicles the origin of Furiosa. She explained on The Graham Norton Show in November that her first time driving a car was while learning the stunts on the movie.
"I don't have a license, I can't parallel park, I can't go on the highway. I still don't have one, but I can do that," she said, referring to video footage of her performing a vehicular stunt called a "juicy lift 180." "At some point that will come in handy, I'm assuming."
Watch the full Around the Table interview with the cast of The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which is in theaters this weekend, in the video above.
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