The Batman: Zoë Kravitz, Matt Reeves, and Dylan Clark Talk Catwoman, The Future of the Character & More
Last week, I had the opportunity to see the highly anticipated The Batman. Afterward, I had a chance to attend a Q&A with some of the cast and crew from the film.
During the Q&A, Zoë Kravitz, Matt Reeves and Dylan Clark talk about what it was like developing the character.
Zoë, for you was there something where, maybe it was the voice or whatever it was for you, where you felt like you really found Selena for you?
Kravitz: The character is so well developed in the script, and I was really excited to explore her backstory and where she comes from, and the process that she goes through in terms of, you know, kind of becoming closer to what will be Catwoman. But it was really lovely to be able to play Selena and not have to jump straight to Catwoman. I think with these, you know, iconic characters that we all love so much, it can be overwhelming in terms of okay, now. Now, here’s Catwoman. And I have this wonderful opportunity to kind of slowly develop her, and the audience gets to come on that journey with me. But you know, obviously learning all the combat and the way she moves and finding ways to kind of hint at, you know, who she will become was, it was a really fun process.
Reeves and Clark went on to talk about why they knew Zoë was perfect for the role.
Clark: I’ll just chime in here just because I was watching you two and I remember, during the screen test, there was a thing you did when you said, you turned on Rob, and you said, “Whoever you are, you must have grown up rich.” And the way you said that we were just like, “Whoa, God, that’s Selina Kyle.” So it was those degrees, those layers of being really kind of feisty in your face and kind of like, “Wow, that girl’s tough for real.” And then I’ve been talking about you for a long time. There’s your skill about showing vulnerability and emotion. That’s Selina Kyle, and you had that from day one. I mean, that you’re that girl.
Reeves: I’ll chime in then too. I would say that Zoë’s process, you know, like when we met, I just knew that you thought so deeply about the character, right? And that for me was so exciting. Like, there were images literally from the comic books that she was like, “God if we could do this moment.” There was stuff from Year One, and I was like, let me see if we can do the same image. And we would do that kind of stuff. And there were certain things that are some of my favorite moments or lines in the movie, and they’re yours. I mean, the moment where we talked a lot about the cats, and we were talking about, like, this notion of the background that she comes from and you know what her life was, and that, in essence, because she was essentially an orphan as well, that she was a stray and that she was collecting cats because now she’s decided she’s going to protect strays. And so that whole conversation led to this whole idea. I was like, “Oh, I love this idea.” This was literally how this happened. I said, “That is so great.”
Kravitz: I really wanted to understand, you know? In the script, when I read the script, it says that she has all these cats and that I understood that that was to kind of to tip off the audience. She’s a catwoman, but I really wanted to understand why.
Wondering if a Catwoman mini-series to accompany on HBO max or something like that might be in the works by chance?
Reeves: Talk to HBO Max. I mean, look, what we’re really trying to do is to launch this world and if the world embraces this, we have a lot of ideas for things we want to do and for sure, we want Selina to continue. What [Selina and Bruce] are to each other, is to me, that’s the heart of the movie. It is the push-pull between the two of them and the way that she’s going to evolve and where all of that will go. So we’re talking about a lot of things. And it really comes down to how people receive it. And we hope that everyone receives it like you, Mark.
Clark: Matt and I worked on the Apes movies. Similarly, when we did Dawn, we hoped it was going to be received well, and, they were. But we had ideas, of course, where Caesar and all of these apes could go. But you really, you put everything into that movie, this one was a really a, this was the one that really killed us all. I mean, it was a long writing process. It was a long, pre pre-production, and then production, as everybody knows, we had to go through a lot of stuff to finish it. And then post was really hard and long. And you just, and that’s why I said this is for me. We’ve been doing Zoom interviews, but to actually sit here with a microphone and look out and talk to people who’ve seen the movie. This is different, and it’s great. So we’re really just living in this moment. And for us to have a first event like this with you guys who know the material as well as you do. Couldn’t be any better start to this proceeding. So we’re living in this moment. And the hope is March , we’ll know a little bit more that people liked it.
Be sure to catch Zoë Kravitz as Catwoman when The Batman hits theaters on March 4.
