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Scarlett Johansson has revealed the lengths she went to be cast in the new Jurassic World film.
The Fly Me To The Moon star, 40, will star in Jurassic World Rebirth as Zora Bennet, a former mercenary leading a group of scientists on a hunt for dinosaur blood that could cure heart disease.
Rupert Friend, Jonathan Bailey, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Mahershala Ali, Luna Blaise, and David Iacono have also been cast in the film, directed by Gareth Edwards (Rogue One, Godzilla).
Speaking to Vanity Fair, Johansson said she spent years monitoring trade publications for reports of any new Jurassic Park films and flagging news to her agents.
“I was really crazy about the [original] film, and I slept in a Jurassic Park pup tent in my bedroom I shared with my sister for a year,” she said.
“Anytime the trades would report a new Jurassic movie, I would forward to my agents like, ‘Hey, I’m available.’”
Johansson said she was filming reshoots for the Marvel film Black Widow at Pinewood Studio in 2020 while Chris Pratt and Bruce Dallas Howard were on the next door soundstage filming Jurassic World Dominion.
“I was like, ‘Show me the sets! I want to participate!’” the actor said.
The Vicky Cristina Barcelona star later landed a meeting with Steven Spielberg, who directed the original 1993 Jurassic Park film and its 1997 sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
“I hadn’t really sat with him and talked about work, and we spent hours just catching up and chatting,” Johansson said.
“Then at some point, many hours into it, he was like, ‘Wait, we’re supposed to talk about Jurassic. Do I hear you’re a huge superfan?’” she recalled. “I said, ‘It is actually true. I’m confirming. I’m a huge superfan.’”
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Johansson admitted she refrained from telling Spielberg about the Jurassic Park tent she slept in for a year because she didn’t want him to think she was “this weird stalker”.
However, the actor now regrets not telling the director about the extent of her Jurassic fandom. “Obviously with all the Avengers stuff you meet so many fans who are profoundly moved by the characters and the world that you’re a part of,” she said.
“I get it. It’s always wonderful to meet people like that. I probably should have just told him. But I was like, ‘Just be professional. Don’t seem desperate. Don’t mention the tent.’”
Last June, Johansson told ComicBook.com that she spent a decade trying to get a role in the dinosaur franchise and told her agents she would even play a character who dies “in the first five minutes”.
“I’m such an enormous fan of the franchise and a huge nerd for it. I’m just like, I can’t even, I’m pinching myself,” the Black Widow star said.
“I’ve been trying to get into this franchise in any possible way for over 10 years. I’m like, ‘I’ll die in the first five minutes! I can get eaten by whatever! I’ll do the craft service!’ I’ll do anything for it.
“The fact that it’s happened in this way at this time just is actually unbelievable. I can’t believe it.”
