There’s a new Batwoman in town. After Ruby Rose’s shocking retirement from the title role last spring, Javicia Leslie will take over the mantle of Gotham City’s latest masked vigilance for the second season of ‘Batwoman’ on The CW.
The 33-year-old actress, best known for her work on the CBS comedy drama “God Friended Me” and the BET crime drama “The Family Business,” plays Ryan Wilder, who is a new addition to the DC universe.
A former drug lord who eluded police in Gotham City for years has a tragic life story: she lost her single mother during childbirth, her adoptive mother was killed before her and she served 18 months in prison for a crime she did not have not committed. Due to the scarcity of her jobs, Ryan is forced to live in a van along the river, this is where she finds Kate Bane’s Batsuit. After taking the pack for a test drive, she feels powerful enough to take control of her own life and to combat the system that has ignored her for decades.
It’s a dream role for Leslie, whose naturally endearing and thoughtful presence is immediately reflected in her dazzling debut as the first black and bisexual actress to wear the legendary hood and hood of Batwoman. As a self-proclaimed ‘super-fan’ of the DC Universe and Arrowverse, Leslie auditioned for the lead role over Zoom in the Covid-19 pandemic for several months.
“I was really shocked,” Leslie told NBC News, recalling the day in early July that she had won the role. “I was really thinking when my driver’s number appeared on my phone, ‘Ugh, I guess I did not get it. “When I answered the phone, she said, ‘May I talk to Ryan Wilder?’ And I just lost it. I could not believe it; I started crying. I called my mom and we cried together. ‘
Leslie was born in the southern German city of Augsburg into a US military family. Leslie grew up in Maryland and earned a business degree from Hampton University, a historically black university in Virginia, where she also starred in several theater productions and fell in love with acting.
“I just loved the idea of getting away from life and how I could really feel the pain I was experiencing as a person,” she said. “It made me realize how much I needed acting.”
Instead of acting after graduation, Leslie decided to find a more stable job in her early twenties and worked her job for two years for the government. While she found the work meaningful, she said she felt ‘suffocated’ and ‘could not express herself’ in a creatively fulfilling way. After ending her contract in 2012, Leslie moved to Los Angeles with some savings to help her change her career, and she has since committed to mastering her trade for the best part of the past decade.
In the eight weeks between the start of the role and the start of the filming, Leslie focuses on staying in shape by using her background in mixed martial arts and creating the background of her character by depicting the disturbing events before Ryan the Batsuit found.
Leslie said the process of developing Ryan’s character was a collaborative process with runner-up Caroline Dries, the executive producer of the series and the rest of the creative team, who also decided early on to revamp the iconic Batsuit to better suit Leslie.
“It was important that you could see the silhouette of Batwoman,” Leslie said. ‘I have a lot of muscle tone on my body, and I think it can be hard to emphasize it. It also helps to show my curves. ”
“Creating an Afro was very important because it was like, ‘OK, if we’re going to do this, let’s do this. If we’re going to have a black batwoman, let’s have a sistah, ” she added. “I think this Batwoman is really strong, and you can see the power in what she looks like when her suit is on.”
Leslie was a proponent of diverse representation on screen and acknowledged that her new role could have the potential to be a game changer in terms of diversity in the superhero genre – especially for black and LGBTQ artists.
‘It’s not for me; it’s for all the people who feel underrepresented, ‘Leslie said. “I think one of the things that makes people who are underrepresented feel that they are not enough and feel that they have to continue so hard to feel that they are being represented is because they could not see themselves.”
Although the reaction to her cast was largely positive, there are always social media haters, including some who have criticized the cast of a strange black woman in the iconic superhero role. But Leslie said she did not let the haters get to her.
‘No one has seen the program yet, so if they have something negative to say, they usually just come from a place of pain from something they are experiencing. “When I look at it like that, I do not take it personally at all,” she said. “It’s just one of the many roles I’ll do in my life, and that’s why I can really work with my goals in mind, it’s just creating incredible content.
Using an appropriate analogy, Leslie said she views the situation “as good versus evil.”
“I can not allow evil to win because it hurts my feelings,” she said. ‘It’s essential that good wins, and that it’s good to finally see it again. It’s good to finally be able to see that someone in the Bat World is black and strange. ”
While the launch of her character will compensate for some of the established character dynamics, namely the one between Batwoman and the supervillain Alice (Rachel Skarsten), Leslie teases that Ryan’s personal journey will drive the development of the second season.
‘Ryan comes in as a solo person on her own mission, and you really see how she needs to change her mentality about what this matter means and what the responsibility of this matter means. “You see how she’s going to start this journey to become a superhero,” Leslie said. ‘She does not start as a superhero at all; she just starts out as a normal person going about this to take her own revenge for things. As she continues this journey, she’s really starting to realize what this suit represents, and so she’s become the superhero Gotham City needs. ”
Season two of “Batwoman” is Sunday at 8pm in The CW.
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