The lastest installment of the “Star Wars” franchise features a mix of old and new faces. Here are quick bios of the seven newest cast members.
DAISY RIDLEY
Role: Rey
Age: 23
Nationality: British
Best known for: “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.” Ridley’s a relative newcomer who had small roles in a few British TV shows.
Interesting fact: Attended the Tring Park School for the Performing Arts. Recent alumni include Lily James (“Cinderella,” the upcoming “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”) and Jessica Brown Findlay (“Downton Abbey,” “Victor Frankenstein”)
Quotable: “I went [to Tring Park School] because initially I was very naughty, and my mom thought if I was busy, I’d be better. And I didn’t really do acting until later on in the school, with an amazing teacher. I left, went traveling, came back. And then it all kind of went from there.”
—Ridley, in an April interview with Entertainment Weekly
JOHN BOYEGA
Role: Finn
Age: 23
Nationality: British
Best known for: British sci-fi film “Attack the Block,” a few episodes of “24: Live Another Day”
Interesting fact: He didn’t tell his parents he’d been cast in “Star Wars” until the first read-through of the script, two months after he’d been cast.
Quotable: “He said [to me], ‘Is it OK if I let my parents know that I’m going to be in the movie?’ I said, ‘Uhh, what?’ He said, ‘Everyone said we can’t talk about it with anyone.’ … So I said, ‘You have to get on the phone right now. In fact, you should get Harrison Ford on the phone to tell your parents you’re in the movie!”
—”Force Awakens” producer Bryan Burk, in a November interview with Entertainment Weekly, about Boyega
GWENDOLINE CHRISTIE
Role: Captain Phasma
Age: 37ish (She says she doesn’t keep track)
Nationality: British
Best known for: Playing the badass Brienne of Tarth on “Game of Thrones,” Commander Lyme in “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 2”
Interesting fact: She thought of becoming a nun.
Quotable: “I think it’s important to shake up the norm and people’s perceptions of what beauty is. But it’s not always been amazing. I found it so frustrating, particularly at the beginning, because I would be told, ‘Sorry love, you’re too tall.’ At one stage I was like, ‘I’ll give this another six months and if this persists, I’ll become a nun.’ … You don’t need to worry about wardrobe options in the morning; you don’t need to worry about make-up.”
—Christie, in a 2013 interview with Stylist magazine
OSCAR ISAAC
Role: Poe Dameron
Age: 36
Nationality: Guatemalan-American
Best known for: “Inside Llewyn Davis,” “Drive,” “A Most Violent Year”
Interesting fact: He was the frontman for ska-punk group the Blinking Underdogs, which opened a couple of times for Green Day, before he applied to and was accepted into Juilliard at age 21.
Quotable: “I was never much of a singer. I was terrible. It’s embarrassing, I was trying to sound like everybody else. I went through a big Cure phase so I was trying to do that kind of dramatic voice.”
—Isaac, in a 2014 interview with the Telegraph
ADAM DRIVER
Role: Kylo Ren
Age: 32
Nationality: American
Best known for: Being that guy from HBO’s “Girls,” “Frances Ha,” “What If” and “This is Where I Leave You”
Interesting fact: He was a Marine.
Quotable: “I auditioned in Chicago for Juilliard and didn’t get in. I was basically living in a back room of my parents’ house, paying rent and not doing anything with my life. I’d like to say it was patriotic to join the Marines, but it was also that I was doing nothing honorable with my life, and spending too much time at McDonald’s.” —Driver, in a 2013 New York Times interview
LUPITA NYONG’O
Role: Maz Kanata
Age: 32
Best known for: “12 Years a Slave,” for which she won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress
Nationality: Mexican-Kenyan
Interesting fact: She was born in Mexico but moved to Kenya when she was less than a year old. Her parents sent her back to Mexico when she was 16 for several months to learn Spanish.
Quotable: “I’m Mexican and Kenyan at the same time. I’ve seen the quarrels over my nationality, but I’m Kenyan and Mexican at the same time. So again, I am Mexican-Kenyan and I am fascinated by carne asada tacos.”
—Nyong’o, in a 2014 interview with El Manana
DOMHNALL GLEESON
Role: General Hux
Age: 32
Best known for: Playing Bill Weasley in the “Harry Potter” movies, “About Time”
Nationality: Irish
Interesting fact: His father is actor Brendan Gleeson (Mad-Eye Moody in the “HP” films).
Quotable: “I was nominated against my father [at the 2015 British Independent Film Awards] and I lost to him. My dad was not there, so I had to go up and accept the award. Alicia Vikander was the lady handing out the trophy, and she was standing there in horror because she thought that I had heard the wrong name and was strutting up because I thought that I had won.”
—Gleeson, in an interview on RTE Radio 1 earlier this month
Sources: IMDB
