A few days ago, a site we never heard of called Nexus Point News reported that Meryl Streep was in talks to play Aslan in the upcoming Narnia film directed by Greta Gerwig. There were many reasons to second guess the validity of the article:
- The proximity to April Fool’s Day. It was published on March 31, but sometimes April Fool’s jokes drop then because of timezones.
- Aslan is a male lion, with a mane, and that is extremely important to the story.
- The source of the news was Nexus Point News, a site that I had never heard of. It was not known how valid the claims would be.
- They didn’t cite where they got the information.
Now Deadline is a reputable outlet, and they were able to reach out to their sources and were able to confirm this to be a fact. However, their sources did not corroborate that Aslan would be female in the new film. It is possible that Meryl Streep’s voice could be used on a male lion because of the tone of voice that Gerwig is going for. Perhaps it’s how she imagined he’d sound when she read the books?
According to Deadline, no offer has been made as of yet, as talks have not yet reached that stage.
Interestingly, one of our writers pointed out that “the C.S. Lewis company has prevented stage productions from casting a female as Aslan. They still have veto power when it comes to casting choices for the production.” But this begs the question… do they have that kind of power on this? Or did they simply not expect anyone to go this direction? And, again, we don’t know if Meryl Streep is playing a female version of the character at all. That remains to be seen, and it is unlikely we will know until it is confirmed by the production, a trailer for the film, which includes Aslan, or this information could be withheld until the movie release.
Personally, I’d prefer someone like Idris Elba to play the role of Aslan. I think he’d do an incredible job in the role. What are your thoughts?
This whole thing has exploded on the internet. I honestly cannot believe this is true. I remember all too well the rumors during the filming of the previous movies. I will believe itbonly after I see her name in the official cast list.
Yeah, this is pretty unbelievable. Deadline reported that she’s currently in talks, and that it hasn’t moved past that to the offer stage. It’s possible that it doesn’t get to the offer stage. We shall see!
what’s funny is Babylon Bee hasn’t even spoofed the story. Like even they look at it and think, “We don’t even believe this.”