“I had a lot of fun keeping it a secret,” the actress admitted in an interview with EW.
Old Man Logan’s wild little surrogate daughter is officially back! Only she’s not so little anymore.
A week before Deadpool and Wolverine hit theaters, Disney and Marvel released a new teaser for the highly anticipated R-rated film, confirming another surprise cameo: Laura, aka X-23, played by The Acolyte’s Dafne Keen.
Entertainment Weekly spoke with 19-year-old Keen, who returns to the role for the first time since playing Laura in 2017’s Logan at age 11. “I had a lot of fun keeping it a secret. I had to do a lot of press for a job I just finished,” Keen said, referring to her role as Jedi Zeke in The Acolyte. “I was asked in every interview, and I just had to lie, which was really fun.”
She credits Andrew Garfield, who had to do something similar to disguise his surprise reappearance as Spider-Man in Spider-Man: No Way Home. “All the inspiration comes from Andrew Garfield,” says Keane. “He’s a master at it.”
Deadpool and Wolverine brings Ryan Reynolds’ Wade Wilson and Hugh Jackman’s Logan together on screen for the first time since 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine. It also marks their formal introduction into Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe – and the introduction of Marvel Comics’ mutants. When Wade is yanked out of his universe by the Time Variance Authority, the multiverse watchdogs introduced in Loki, he embarks on a mission across multiple alternate dimensions that brings him together with a version of Jackman’s Wolverine from a parallel reality.
Several other characters from previous X-Men films are making their way into Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe alongside Deadpool and Wolverine. Several have been rumored for weeks; others have been strongly hinted at, such as Lady Deathstrike from X2 and Azazel from X-Men: First Class; one has even been reported by the Hollywood trades. Only Aaron Stanford’s Pyro, Tyler Mane’s Sabretooth, and now Todd and Keane’s Laura have been officially confirmed.
Shortly after making Logan, which was initially set to be Jackman’s final appearance in the X-Men franchise for eight times as Wolverine, Keene hoped she would return as Logan’s mute but extremely deadly child. “It was a reality that then somehow fell through,” she says. “There was talk of making a script. I had heard it was an X-23 [movie]. I don’t know how much of what I’m saying is true because I was 11, but it’s what I heard through rumors.”
Then Disney bought 20th Century Fox, the Hollywood studio behind the X-Men films at the time, and those hopes were dashed. “I was quite sad,” she recalls of the moment. “I thought, ‘Oh well, I guess that’s it. This is life, and I have to move’on’—even though it’s one of the greatest characters I’ve ever played, and the annoying thing is that I had to play it at the age of 11.”
Daffney Keen’s X-23 in ‘Logan.photo 20th Century Fox Film Corp. / Courtesy Everett
Not so! Keen had just landed iconic genre roles like Lyra Belacqua in HBO’s His Dark Materials and Zeke in The Acolyte when she landed Deadpool and Wolverine. Her agents had been negotiating in secret for a month straight when Keen got the call while relaxing after 12 hours of filming and stunt training. “I immediately screamed,” Keen continues. “I dropped my phone in the bathwater. I had to put it in the rice; it was a big deal.”
Keene admits it was nerve-wracking to return to a role she played as a child eight years ago. “I was a little nervous,” she says of going on set. “I was thinking, ‘I’ve forgotten how to play her. She’s not in me anymore.'” Keen rewatched Logan to prepare, trying to remember what she was doing as a young actor. “We went straight into this very intense scene. I know I was nervous,” she adds. “As soon as they said, ‘Rolling!’ I literally felt like we were back on Logan. It felt like eight years hadn’t passed.”
Dafne Keen will reportedly have “more of a supporting role” as Laura/X-23 in ‘DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE’
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In Logan, Wolverine became Laura’s surrogate father and eventually gave his life protecting his clone, as well as other young mutant children hunted by a secret organization. In Deadpool and Wolverine, Laura is now older and wiser—and even speaking! “Laura has lived around a lot of English-speaking people now, so her accent is always neutral. Obviously, she speaks a little bit of Spanish,” Keene said, referring to her upbringing in Madrid. “I had to incorporate that.”
More importantly, the biggest difference between child Laura and teenage Laura is that the character has an understanding of where Wolverine was in her life during the events of Logan. “It was wonderful to come back to her as an adult and explore her,” she explains, “to now understand more the rage of a parent and bring that out for her. I found that Laura in Logan oscillates between finding a father and then losing her father. We find that she re-learns how to appreciate—aand with such understanding—hhow much her father meant to her.” But, of course, Laura is still Laura. She’s still a physical and wild character. “That’s how I found her again,” Keane says. “[She] didn’t have to find too much. She was just inside me. The first thing I did for Deadpool was stunt training before we shot anything. I put on the costume and it was like, ‘Oh! She’s back.'”
idea&Source: Comicbook.com
