Anna Sawai has impressed fans with her performance in FX’s ‘Shogun’. She played the role of Toda Mariko and looked quite fitting in that. Before ‘Shogun’, fans saw Sawai in the ‘F9’ and Monsterverse series ‘Monarch: Legacy Of Monsters‘.
During a recent interview, Sawai revealed she got the chance to play the role of Katana in 2016’s ‘Suicide Squad’. However, she had to pass the role and eventually ‘The Boys’ star Karen Fukuhara played the role of Japanese Assassin.
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Anna Sawai Talks About Turning Down The Role Of Katana
The ‘Shogun’ star was part of a girl group named FAKY. Her association with the girl group made her famous in Japan. She was signed with a major entertainment company, Apex, which had helped numerous J-Pop stars.
Anna Sawai revealed to The Hollywood Reporter she was allured to make a career in acting after her very first movie, ‘Ninja Assassin’, in 2009. She was undergoing training during that time and Apex allowed her to feature in the movie. Apex told her that joining FAKY would further help her break into the acting industry.
However, when the role of Katana for ‘Suicide Squad’ knocked on her door, FAKY told her she couldn’t audition for the role as extracurricular acting was not permitted. Sawai said, “I was like, ‘This is my chance!’ And then I go to my manager and he’s like, ‘You can’t audition.’ They basically told me that if I’m gone for over a month, the girls [the other members of FAKY] are not going to have anything to do… It felt like they were really tying me down, and because of my contract, I couldn’t leave until the time that I actually left.”
She also said she loved the work of Karen Fukuhara as Katana. Sawai said, “She did an amazing job, and I respect her so much, and I love her. But also, I would have loved to audition for it.”
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Anna Sawai On Playing Toda Mariko In ‘Shogun’
Yahoo! News got the chance to talk to Anna Sawai at ‘People in 10’. Sawai talked about playing Lady Mariko. She said, “I thought that I had kind of let her go the moment that I wrapped because the next day, I had to go on to a different project, but when we started doing press for Shōgun before its release, I saw how much I was still carrying because I couldn’t talk about certain scenes or the character without tearing up.”
She further added, “It’s also such a special time because the cherry blossom petals are now falling, and people probably know the quote that she says, which is ‘Flowers are only flowers because they fall,’ and I think it’s such a Mariko thing for her to kind of be released now.”
Fans and critics are applauding Sawai for her performance. Fans might see her again in season 2 of ‘Pachinko 2’.
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