For most people in the US, you probably know Eiza Gonzalez from her breakout role in “Baby Driver.” From there, she’s landed roles in films such as “Bloodshot,” “Alita: Battle Angel,” “I Care A Lot,” and the upcoming “Godzilla vs. Kong.” But really, according to the actress, even after a teen idol-type career in Mexico, it is only because her mom took the initiative and landed her a “Star Wars” audition that Gonzalez is where she is now. Yes, you read that right. Her mom landed her an audition for “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.”
In an interview with Collider (seen below), Eiza Gonzalez explained how, even without any sort of agent, manager, or representation, her mother was able to snag an audition for her daughter in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.” And it’s that process of trying to land the role of Rey (eventually going to Daisy Ridley, obviously) that Gonzalez found Hollywood opportunities.
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The story begins with Gonzalez coming to the US after a tough career as a teen actor in Mexico. Without any direction and representation, her mother decided to take it upon herself to get her daughter’s career going.
“She’s like, ‘Oh, some friend of mine told me something about this thing called IMDbPro. I think you have a profile. I think I’m gonna put your name and my email under it and just see what happens,’” explained Gonzalez. “And I [was] just like, ‘Sure, mom.’ And she knew that I was really depressed and sad at the time. So then she called me one day and she’s like, ‘There’s this audition.’ I was like, ‘I don’t even know how to audition in America. I don’t have a rep.’ They’re like, ’They’re just telling you to go.’ So I did. I had no idea. I’d never auditioned in English in my life, but I just did it for shits and giggles, you know?”
She continued, “I was like, ‘Okay, I’ll do it. It’s not going to happen!’ So then I did and then, it sounds very self-indulgent but it really happened this way, I had a callback and then I didn’t really know what I was auditioning for, and then I had another callback and I was like, ‘What is happening?’ And then, long story short, it turned out I was auditioning for ‘Star Wars,’ for ‘The Force Awakens.’”
And the actress continued by saying that she had no idea about what film the audition was for due to the incredible Lucasfilm secrecy and whatnot. But she still made it “pretty far” in her pursuit of the Rey role.
“I was completely clueless. Because you know, they give you dummy sides. You don’t know what you’re reading,” she explained. “Now I know all this information, but at the time, you can see; I think Daisy Ridley was just cast out of nowhere. They like unknown people. So we were lucky to do that. Obviously didn’t book it, but went pretty far and I was like, ‘Great, awesome. That was great. Moving back to Mexico. It didn’t happen. That will be a great story for the rest of my life.’ And then like a week later I got a call on my flip phone at the time that I had bought at a CVS, and I got a call from a casting director and she’s like, ‘Oh, this other director saw your material. He wants to read you. Can you read?’ I tape myself, long story short, it was Robert Rodriguez, a month later I was moving to Austin and I did ‘From Dusk Till Dawn,’ and I don’t know how this happened. My second audition.”
Of course, we now know that Gonzalez landed the role in the TV adaptation of “From Dusk Till Dawn,” which then led to “Baby Driver” and everything else. So, you have to assume that Eiza Gonzalez loses every disagreement with her mother out of sheer respect, right? Not only did her mother bring her into this world (a common thing moms say), but she also basically created her Hollywood career. That’s some big-time parental ammunition.
You can see Gonzalez in “I Care A Lot” on Netflix now, and “Godzilla vs. Kong” in theaters and on HBO Max on March 31.
