Ahead of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore’s release this Friday, actress Jessica Williams revealed that she based her character Lally’s wand work after tennis legends Venus and Serena Williams.
Williams, better known for her work on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart as one of the correspondents, appeared on an episode of Collider Ladies Night, discussing everything from her very first acting gig to now entering the Wizarding World.
The actress portrays Professor Eulalie “Lally” Hicks in the threequel of the Fantastic Beasts series, as a part of Albus Dumbledore’s team of powerful wizards who come together in hopes to stop Gellert Grindelwald.
Lally is portrayed as a confident and determined character. To channel the character’s strength and capability through her wand work, Williams explained that a huge source of her inspiration were tennis’ legendary sisters, Serena and Venus Williams.
“I’m so excited about my character. I think she’s really strong and really capable. She’s really good at defensive magic and she has some really cool, badass sequences in this movie that I’m so excited for everyone to see. I modeled a lot of her wand work after Serena and Venus Williams. I like that she does this really cool, strong magic like she really means it.
Lally is a Charms professor at Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, working alongside the best team Dumbledore could assemble with Magizoologist Newt Scamander, Newt’s brother Theseus, Bunty Broadacre, Yusuf, and No-Maj Jacob Kowalski.
“Eulalie is really heart-driven and I think she’s really good at seeing at the heart of people, and I think Dumbledore recruits her because he knows that about her. And I think she’s somebody you can always depend on to do what’s good and what’s right.”
Although Williams appeared in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, it was a very short cameo. The third film gives her the chance to explore her character better. When asked if she was expecting to be more involved when she first played the tiny part, Williams answered,
“I’d always known that my character was supposed to be throughout the rest of the Fantastic Beasts films… And I knew that in Crimes of Grindelwald, she makes a brief appearance, but then in 3, 4 and 5, she’s quite formidable and becomes a huge part of the story.”
As Williams mentioned, Warner Bros. has plans to add two more films to the Fantastic Beasts franchise.
Although the film had a poor reception at the international box office when it released early in some countries, the final verdict will be delivered when it drops in the US and other major markets this Friday.
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore comes out in theatres on Friday, April 15.
About Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is an upcoming fantasy film directed by David Yates, with a screenplay by J. K. Rowling and Steve Kloves, from an original story by Rowling. It is the third installment in the Fantastic Beasts film series and the eleventh overall in the Wizarding World franchise.
The film stars an ensemble cast including Eddie Redmayne, Katherine Waterston, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, Ezra Miller, Callum Turner, William Nadylam, Poppy Corby-Tuech, Jessica Williams, Jude Law, and Mads Mikkelsen.
Set several years after The Crimes of Grindelwald, it follows Albus Dumbledore tasking Newt Scamander and his allies with a mission that takes them into the heart of dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald’s army. Set in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and partly in Berlin, Germany, and leads up to the Wizarding World’s involvement in World War II.
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