Summary
- Actor Emily Rudd spent years preparing for her role as Nami in the upcoming One Piece live-action adaptation, promoting herself as a potential actor for the role and emulating Nami’s appearance and skills.
- Rudd was ecstatic to finally audition for the role and called it her dream job, feeling lucky and grateful for the opportunity.
- Rudd’s personal experience as a navigator in her day-to-day life and her love for reading maps and planning routes helped her identify with Nami’s character, jokingly stating that she was “born to be Nami.”
Actor Emily Rudd revealed she spent years preparing for her role as Nami in the upcoming One Piece live-action adaptation.
Per ComicBook, Rudd claimed she immediately began promoting herself as a potential actor for Nami shortly after hearing about Netflix’s plans for a live-action television show. “One Piece is one of my favorite manga and I’ve always felt drawn to Nami in particular,” she said. “When I heard they were making a live-action series, I started not-so-secretly playing the long game in lobbying for this role for three years. I colored my hair red and got it cut just like Nami’s. I posted a video of myself when I was younger tumbling and doing backflips, things like that.”
The actor further stated she spared no effort in trying to emulate Nami, with Rudd attempting to convince as many people as possible to cast her as the fan-favorite Cat Burglar. She continued, “I was just trying my hardest to get anyone who might notice to really see me as Nami. So, to audition finally, I was like, ‘Oh my God, I did it! I can’t believe I did it. What timeline am I in? How did I get so lucky?’ It was crazy. I got to work my dream job.”
Emily Rudd Was Born to Play Nami
Rudd also previously spoke regarding how she identified with Nami’s character, with the actor revealing she was used to playing the role of a navigator in her day-to-day life. She additionally claimed she was used to reading maps and planning routes in the wilderness due to her childhood holidays, wherein she experienced “‘middle of nowhere, bathroom is a hole in the ground somewhere in the forest’-type camping.” Rudd believed she was a natural navigator, with the actor jokingly stating that she was “born to be Nami.”
Based on mangaka Eiichiro Oda’s massively popular manga series of the same name, One Piece follows the journey of the Straw Hat Pirates, a group of unique characters who have embarked on an adventure on the high seas in search of the titular treasure. Rudd’s co-star Iñaki Godoy, who plays the series’ protagonist Monkey D. Luffy, assured longtime fans of the franchise that the live-action adaptation will remain faithful to the source material. Oda himself additionally penned an open letter to fans, wherein he claimed there were “no compromises” throughout the production of the Netflix series.
The live-action One Piece adaptation premieres on Aug. 31 exclusively on Netflix.
Source: ComicBook