Star Wars: The Power Awakens grossed over $2 billion, however when John Boyega booked the position of Finn, he had simply £45 in his checking account.
Whereas talking throughout a panel on the Chicago Comedian & Entertainment Expo (by way of Folks), Boyega defined why he’ll “never forget the day” that J.J. Abrams informed him he can be starring in The Power Awakens.
“I had been auditioning for so long, so I felt like he kind of took away my dignity a little bit,” Boyega mentioned. “I decided to pretend as if I was busy, you know, when you just pretend that you’re busy. ‘I got other stuff to do, J.J.’ He goes, ‘Where are you?’ And I said, ‘I’m at this art show in Greenwich, mate. I’m very, very busy. Where are you?’ He goes, ‘Well, I’m in Mayfair and [at a] restaurant. Need to talk to you now. And we’ll talk about something important.’ And I go, ‘Okay, okay, I’m gonna be right there.’ At the time I had £45 in my account. It took £33 and 83p to get to J.J. Do the math.”
Boyega continued, “So I am going in. Every step I took, I used to be nervous. I used to be like, ‘Okay, cool.’ You realize, J.J. is an exceptional, good man, and if he was to inform me I didn’t get the half, he would nonetheless feed me. And so I sat down and, J.J. simply mentioned, ‘Thank you so much for coming back. I know we’ve sort of [strained] you with this quantity of auditions.’ At the moment, I took it upon myself to try to get one other audition and go like, ‘J.J., please. Look, I can audition again. I can do British, Scottish, Nigerian, whatever. And he goes, ‘You’re [in Star Wars].’“
The actor mentioned he froze at that second. “Like I even noticed how many sugar cubes were in this very crush little cup that was on the table. Everything felt very surreal,” he recalled. “After which this simply places the Star Wars stamp on it: [The Force Awakens co-writer Lawrence Kasdan] walks out and he mentioned, ‘Kid, this movie’s gonna change your life.’ And that’s the Hollywood s—. You realize what I’m saying?“
Whereas The Power Awakens might have made a star out of John Boyega, the franchise didn’t make one of the best use of his character, and the actor even criticized Disney for its remedy of characters performed by folks of color.
