Talisa Garcia has been cast in the Disney Plus spin-off series Willow, making her the first openly trans actor to appear in a Lucasfilm production.
According to Deadline, Garcia will portray a queen, the mother of Tony Revolori’s unnamed character. It’s also a landmark moment elsewhere, as Garcia’s casting marks the first time a trans actor has played a cis character in a Disney Plus movie or series.
This follows on from other milestone steps at Disney, including Raya and the Last Dragon’s Patti Harrison becoming the first trans actor to voice a character in a Disney animated movie.
Garcia and Revolori – who is best known to MCU fans as Flash Thompson in the recent Marvel/Sony trilogy of Spider-Man movies – will be joined by Willow himself, Warwick Davis. Rounding out the cast is Erin Kellyman, Ellie Bamber, and Ruby Cruz.
Willow, the spin-off series of the cult 1988 fantasy, is mooted for a 2022 release and joins a wave of Lucasfilm projects currently in the works.
As of writing, those include Indiana Jones 5 – starring Harrison Ford and Phoebe Waller-Bridge – and multiple Star Wars projects. The Mandalorian season 3, Star Wars: Rogue Squadron, Andor, and movies from both Kevin Feige and Taika Waititi in a galaxy far, far away are just some of what we have to look forward to from Lucasfilm over the coming years. Its next release, the Obi-Wan Kenobi series, has recently shifted release dates to May 27 – though will release its first two episodes at once.
For more on those, check out our guide to upcoming Star Wars movies.
