Solo: A Star Wars Movie is making a big ask of audiences: Accept a different actor playing a character introduced in A New Hope. Alden Ehrenreich will be playing a more callow version of a certain smuggler-turned-rebel-hero, with Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian and Woody Harrelson and Emilia Clarke as figures from Han’s life of crime, according to Esquire.
And Han Solo is not just any character. He is the closest thing the Star Wars kingdom has to Bogart or Wolverine. But Ehrenreich has consistently stepped up to the roles he’s been put in, such as his part in Hail, Caesar!, where he played a not-so-smart cowboy. He’s got versatile talent, writes Esquire, and an ability to go from drama to dumbass and back. The directors say that Ehrenreich was “literally the first actor they saw for Han,” according to Esquire, and that he stood out from his “very first screen test.” Francis Ford Coppola, who is friends with longtime casting manager Fred Roos, said that Ehrenreich is a “total sponge” who wants to learn as much as he can.
Despite his talent and skill, people are of course questioning the choice to make him Solo. Ehrenreich does have a lot in common with the character: They are both rookies trying to prove themselves. And maybe the biggest reason Ehrenreich is right for the role? He knows that the best he can do is play Han Solo his way and that there is nothing he can do to change or even predict what will happen after that.
“You can control your decision to say yes, and you can control your own work, the work you put into it,” he said to Esquire. “And you can control how you treat people. And”—he laughs—“that’s about it … In a way, walking a tightrope that’s a lot higher is a great way to learn that lesson more profoundly.”
Thanks for reading InsideHook. Sign up for our daily newsletter and be in the know.
