Her eyes have special meaning and power. “I had some specific ideas about how she would work and what she would do,” Abrams says. “I had this pitch about these goggles that she wore. Her eyes are an important aspect of her character, and you’ll see how it plays out.”
He also says she was a pirate for a very long time, and “she’s lived over a thousand years. She’s had this watering hole for about a century, and it’s like another bar that you’d find in a corner of the Star Wars universe.”
The cover of Vogue is a big deal, and Lupita Nyong’o has now scored her second in as many years. The October issue features the actress, who talks a little about The Force Awakens – and J.J. Abrams himself sheds a little light on what they were looking for in the role:
While we tuck into delicious platters of fish, sorbets, and cheeses, Lupita tells me that she has just spent four months filming a CGI character—a pirate named Maz Kanata—for J. J. Abrams’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens, opening this December. “We needed a powerful actress to play a powerful character,” the director explains to me later. “Lupita was someone I’d known a little and was enormously fond of. More important, her performance in 12 Years a Slave blew my mind, and I was vaguely desperate to work with her.”
Acting a motion-capture character was “really bizarre and lots of fun,” Lupita says. “I really enjoyed the fact that you’re not governed by your physical presence in that kind of work. You can be a dragon. You can be anything.”
Again, it’s very Vogue, but she also talks about her life in Kenya and America. She answers a few more Star Wars questions on video:
Legendary poster artist Drew Struzan told Movie Weekly that The Force Awakens is “probably going to be the best Star Wars you’ve ever seen.” Pretty high praise, even from a guy being paid by Lucasfilm. He also talks about how J.J. Abrams called him up, how much of the film he’s seen, his process, and why the lightsaber colors on the Revenge of the Jedi poster were reversed.
→ On that note, a nice, if top-heavy, piece from newcomer The Star Wars Post on if Star Wars 7 News leaking the Luke Skywalker image crossed a spoiler line. I’ll just say that SW7N has never exactly been known for their sound judgement, which is why I tend to warn so profusly when linking them.
There’s already one piece of supposed concept art for The Force Awakens character played by Lupita Nyong’o out there, but Making Star Wars has another that seems to be more connected to the tiny glimpse we get of her in the trailer.
Of course, we won’t know for sure until the powers-that-be choose to reveal her… Or some sort of product leaks. Start placing your bets now, I suppose.
Rumor: A look at Maz Kanata? Indie Revolver has concept art of what they claim is Lupita Nyong’o’s character in The Force Awakens. Per usual (especially with concept art) it’s a big maybe, and may not be exact, particularly if one believes that Maz is the person handing over the lightsaber in the second trailer.
Disney had their earnings call today, in the aftermath of May 4, where Bob Iger talked up their “carefully designed marketing plan” for Star Wars. (…Yeah.) A research film, meanwhile, revealed that the franchise had “197 percent more digital consumption” yesterday than Avengers: Age of Ultron had on the day it was released.
→ The Vanity Fair newsletter photo reveal is an alternate take of Lupita Nyong’o, and a bit of an interview with J.J. Abrams. The full interview goes up tomorrow.
And now, the actual Vanity Fair photoshoot is up – with one more photo set to go out in their email newsletter. We do get a name for Lupita Nyong’o’s CGI character: Maz Kanata, a pirate who has a castle populated with a variety of riffraff. We also get a nice shot of Oscar Isaac and his X-Wing, Rey (and J.J. Abrams) on Jakku and Abrams with Kathleen Kennedy, John Williams and Lawrence Kasdan.
UPDATE: And the last photo has been spotted. Gwendoline Christie is confirmed as Captain Phasma, the chrome stormtrooper. You can read most of the article at VF as well, plus the prequel spreads are back up!
A little bit of Vanity Fair’s cover story on The Force Awakens went up at midnight – along with a behind-the-scenes video that gives us a peek at what some of the pictures may be – including a helmetless Kylo Ren (Yes, he’s Adam Driver. Shocking!)
There’s also a bigger version of the cover, but no more pictures – yet. One is set to go out in VF’s email newsletter tomorrow afternoon, though. And head below the cut for a few screenshots from the video.
The issue will be available digitally on May 7, and on newsstands May 12.
So it’s pretty much a sure thing that Felicity Jones is going to be one of the stars of the upcoming spin-off at this point, and we can agree if this counts as a ‘confirmation – but she told MTV’s Josh Horowitz that she “can’t talk about it.” (Lupita N’yongo says she’s sure it will “change her life even more.”)
Naturally that’s about all we’re going to get for anything upcoming, but Star Wars had a couple moments in the opening act. Bib Iger’s wife even wore one of the Rodarte Star Wars dresses on the red carpet.
Today’s biggest rumor adds another wrinkle to all the teaser trailer reports, but it wasn’t the only thing we heard today.
→ The Hollywood Reporter has an article on secrecy measures taken on the Episode VII set – and how some of them failed. Mostly this revolves around the Greenham Common and Puzzlewood set stuff and the occasional tweet – nothing about the (apparently) massive concept art leaks, the stormtroopers or any of the most mysterious things we’ve heard.
An object from the TMZ pics gets a mention, bit not the leak itself. Oversight? Request? Either way, it seems like they’re deliberately ignoring a huge chunk of stuff that’s been fueling the madness, and that just seems really odd. My conspiracy theory that many of these ‘leaks’ are intended to be misleading really doesn’t need the help, THR.
Though, for those who are constantly railing that Lucasfilm needs to address every rumor/leak that comes down the tubes, this rings very true:
Disney, besieged by the blanket media coverage of the shoot, essentially has thrown up its hands, choosing to ignore it all. “There’s so much out there, it’s easier to not correct false rumors because then people think the stuff we don’t correct is true,” says one insider.
The article also reveals one step that was taken at Pinewood: Stickers over phone cameras.
→ On that note, we have yet another concept art description from Jason at Making Star Wars, this one of a location and the type of characters we may meet there. Underworld added onto this, saying that one of those characters may be the one played by Lupita Nyong’o. Jason comes back with more description of said character. Curious…
Lupita Nyong’o’s Maz Kanata is indeed the orange alien we see on the poster, J.J. Abrams confirms to Entertainment Weeky, and the googles are an important part of her character:
The cover of Vogue is a big deal, and Lupita Nyong’o has now scored her second in 
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