Moana star Catherine Laga’aia has spoken about embracing nepotism. The Samoan-Australian actress will make her feature film debut in Disney‘s live-action remake of the 2016 film.
What did Catherine Laga’aia say about her Star Wars dad?
Ahead of the film’s release, Laga’aia opened up about her father, Jay Laga’aia, in an interview with People. Jay played Captain Typho in Star Wars Episodes 2 and 3, alongside appearing in films like Crooked Business, The Unbroken, and TV shows like Hardball, Jay’s Jungle, and more. His daughter, Catherine, previously starred in the 2023 TV series The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart.
“I inherited nepotism, that’s for sure. I’ll take that anytime,” she said. “I think having my dad in the industry, as well as wanting to do the OG proud, and wanting to do the people who love the movies proud, I feel my biggest thing was I wanted him to be proud. He knows what’s good, he knows what he likes. I’m someone on his side. That’s the part of my family that I’m representing.”
Lagaʻaia was chosen from over thousands of competing actors for the film. According to director Thomas Kail, she was chosen for the role within “about 10 seconds.” The Moana remake retells the story of the 2016 film. Laga’aia is the second performer to portray Moana, following Auli’i Cravalho’s voice performance in the animated film. Dwayne Johnson, who voiced Maui in the original film, will reprise the role in the live-action remake. The actor also revealed that Disney is working on a third installment, which suggests that the live-action film’s performance won’t negatively affect the franchise.
While the remake appears set to recreate many iconic moments from the animated original, early predictions for its box office performance are not looking good, as the movie faces some potential problems.
