Project Hail Mary Directors Open Up About Casting Meryl Streep In Cameo You Probably Missed
Between its hilarious advertising campaign, Ryan Gosling back in full leading man mode and Oscar nominee Sandra Hüller delivering a karaoke performance for the ages, Project Hail Mary is the movie the whole world is talking about right now.
Adapted from the popular Andy Weir novel of the same name, the sci-fi adventure features an impressive cast that also includes Industry’s Ken Leung and The Bear’s Lionel Boyce – but the fact that one of Hollywood’s most recognisable names is also in the movie might have passed you by.
Meryl Streep is one of the voices of the alien Rocky, with directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller having now opened up about exactly how they managed to snag the three-time Oscar winner for their new movie.
When putting together the character of Rocky, Phil and Chris began by doing “a bunch of silly voices ourselves”, before inviting members of the crew to try it out themselves.
Phil recalled to Entertainment Weekly: “We tried to imagine voices that would be preloaded into a text-to-speech kind of translator.”
It was then that the idea to try and secure Streep for the part, with the directors turning to the legendary producer Amy Pascal in the hopes that her existing relationship with the Devil Wears Prada star might play in their favour.
“And then she did, and she was wonderful,” Phil said, with Chris adding: “she was so fun and thoughtful and playful and did a million different versions: ‘I’ll do more. You want me to try this? Try that?’.
“But every time you rehearsed in the mirror, going, ‘Meryl, would you by any chance want to play a rejected voice of an alien?’ Just trying to explain it to her… ‘You know what? I’m going to ask her tomorrow’.”
Interestingly, Project Hail Mary is one of two films featuring voice work from Meryl in cinemas now, with the legendary actor also playing a role in the new Pixar project Hoppers.
These two movies have brought an and to a hiatus from the big screen of almost five years from Meryl, who last appeared in the film Don’t Look Up.
In that time, she has appeared in several TV roles, though, most notably the award-winning mystery comedy Only Murders In The Building.
Later this year, she’s also due to reprise the role of Miranda Priestley in the long-awaited Devil Wears Prada sequel, released 20 years after the original movie.