Star Wars actress Kelly Marie Tran has opened up about the pressures of playing Disney’s first Southeast Asian princess in upcoming animation feature Raya and the Last Dragon.
While taking part in The Wrap‘s The Future Is Now: Next Gen Hollywood Roundtable at the publication’s Power Women Summit, Tran claim that “it should not feel so precious that there is something like this that exists in the world.”
She added: “There should just be so many. Do you know what I mean? I feel like sometimes when you are in an underrepresented group of people and you get this opportunity, you sort of have to do all of these mental Olympics, and that’s such an unfair pressure to put on yourself.”
Tran went on to admit that she shared a similar experience when she was making Star Wars: The Last Jedi, recalling how she had to remind herself that she “deserved” to be involved in the franchise because she’s good at what she does.
“I have to tell myself that every day,” she noted. “So I’m telling you right now, snaps for all of you for just existing in this world that just takes more energy to exist in when you feel like you have been other-ed.
“[It’s] the idea that our stories are valid and we deserve to tell them in any way that we want to. We deserve to tell them repeatedly from different angles, and it shouldn’t be just this one thing that we’re so desperate to grasp on to.”
Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon will arrive in cinemas on March 21st 2021 and on Disney+ Premier at the same time!
