Jurassic World Dominion Star Dichen Lachman on Ruling the Dinosaur Black Market

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The post Jurassic World Dominion Star Dichen Lachman on Ruling the Dinosaur Black Market appeared first on Consequence.

Dichen Lachman says she was cast in Jurassic World Dominion based on a photograph. “When I met [director Colin Trevorrow], he said that initially [casting director Nina Gold] showed him photos of a very limited number of girls,” she tells Consequence via Zoom. “He was looking for someone who could be from anywhere, and he wanted Soyona to be, you know, ambiguous and have that mystery about her. And he told me, ‘I pointed to your photo and I was like, that’s her, that’s the character.'”

Lachman, whose previous projects include Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Animal Kingdom, Altered Carbon, and Dollhouse, is aware that her ethnic background (Tibetan and Australian) plays a big role in what roles she does and doesn’t get.

“This is in a funny way what this business is like,” she says. “You have a writer or a director and they’ve got this essence in their mind and when they see it, they’re just like, ‘That’s the person.’ And so it’s actually really reassuring as an actor because, you know, it’s not personal. The person who’s putting the tapestry together, they just have something in their mind and it’s either you or it’s not, and there’s nothing you can do to change that.”

In Dominion, the film and TV actress plays Soyona Santos, a shady character involved in the illegal dinosaur black market, who Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) and Owen (Chris Pratt) encounter in Malta. According to Lachman, Trevorrow “wanted an international feel to this character, because of where she fits into the story, and I do have that look where I can be from anywhere, you know?” But, she adds, “I always thought that that would be what would make this career probably the hardest for me.”

She did get some striking words of support early in her career, from a producer from her first job in the United States on, as she describes it, “another dinosaur movie called Aztec Rex — a real, um gem.” Lachman played an Aztec princess in the Sci-Fi Channel film (“There was a T-Rex on our island to whom we sacrificed lambs and sometimes people too, I think we called him the Thunder God or something”) and the producer became a father figure to her.

“He was always so kind to me and gave me advice and still calls me every year on my birthday. And he was like, ‘You know, Dichen, your look will make it difficult for you, and make you not right for a lot of stuff.’ But then he said, ‘But when it works, there’ll be no one else.’ And I’ve always remembered that,” she says.

“Sometimes it’s frustrating, because you as an actor want to be right for everything, but in terms of the world and how people are pattern recognition machines… In a very simplistic way, I do have an international look,” she explains. “So sometimes, when you are telling a real story from the real world, you want to be true to that environment, to be true to that time or that particular story, and putting someone like me in there wouldn’t make any sense, or it might make the audience confused or something.”

Lachman continues, “But having that international look — dare I say, an exotic look — has actually led to me having a really interesting career, and I’ve been able to play in so many different worlds in these fantastical or futuristic places. And since that’s what I’m a fan of, I love being in it, too.”

While all of Lachman’s Jurassic World Dominion scenes were set in Malta, Lachman didn’t get to make the trip, instead shooting her scenes in the England-based “bubble” created to safely allow production on the film during the pre-vaccine days of the pandemic. This means that while she hasn’t yet seen Judd Apatow’s Netflix comedy The Bubble, she does have some thoughts about it.

Below, Lachman reveals what she said to Apatow about The Bubble at a recent event, while also revealing the backstory she created for her Dominion character and what it was like joining the cast of Apple TV+’s breakout Emmys hit Severance. She also digs into the impact Dollhouse, the 2009-2010 Joss Whedon drama, has had on her career — specifically, how it changed everything for her.


How did you initially get involved with Dominion? Because I know that with projects like this, you can sometimes basically get told by your agent, “There’s something really cool coming up, no one can tell you what it is, but read these lines of dialogue and see what happens.”

Oh, yeah. That’s actually a fun story. So I met with this director to do this horror movie and it was sort of up in the air and it was in South Africa, and that day [my agent] was like, “Oh, you know, they’re going in a different direction for the horror movie.” And I was like, “Oh, that’s fine. You know, I didn’t really see myself in that role anyway.” Maybe I shouldn’t say this, but I don’t like watching horror movies, and so I don’t have like a huge desire to be in them.

And then, [my agent] said, “But I just got a call from [casting director] Nina Gold, and she wants you to put something down for Jurassic. And I was like, what? Because those auditions are few and far between, and often they’re just offered to somebody. You don’t get to audition for these big, big movies. They just like have someone in mind and they go that way.

So I was super excited and I’d already forgotten about the horror [movie], could care less. We filmed the audition, we sent it and then Nina’s associate Martin called me. And he gave me a couple of notes, and I did it again. And then I got a call saying, “Colin wants to meet you.”

I guess they’d had the conversations, you know, potentially beforehand, and he offered me the role, like on the spot, which almost never happens. He was like, I’d love you to do this part. Like, you know, if, if you wanna do it, like we’d love to have you play Sierra — the character’s name was Sierra at the time.

That’s ironic. [Ed. note: Sierra was the name of Lachman’s character on Dollhouse.]

Right? I was like, “Yes. That’s a definite yes.” I was so taken aback, I didn’t think that would happen. And it was a really nice meeting and I called my agent afterwards and I was like, “I think he just offered me the movie.” I didn’t even believe what happened. My husband Max, who’s an actor, when I told him, he wept, he was so happy, and [my friends] were here and they were just like weeping with happiness. And I was still in shock.

I know it’s so silly to be so happy about something like that. But when you’re an actor and your whole life is always on the precipice of something, to be part of such a enormous franchise, that means so much to so many people over the decades, it really feels like a victory. So yeah, I was in complete shock.

I read in the press notes that you put a lot of time into coming up with your character’s backstory, which we never get to really get into in the film. I would love to hear the broad strokes of what you came up with.

Oh, absolutely. I got what, you know, obviously I was so excited and I wanted to be like the best student and I wanted to, like, even though it wouldn’t make it into the movie, like maybe there was a chance or something. So I just started researching about smugglers, you know, and and I came across the fossil smuggling trade. In Siberia and Mongolia, there’s a wealth of fossils there. In fact, the fighting dinosaurs, I think, were discovered in Mongolia. I think they were Velociraptors.

So I came up with this idea that she’s from a very wealthy family, and her mother was in the fossil smuggling trade in Mongolia, and her dad came to enormous wealth during the aluminum wars in Siberia. And that’s how they met, and that’s how she’s in this world — she went to boarding school in England and she speaks like five languages.

It was more detailed than this — I’m giving you the broad strokes — but it was so much fun to learn about different times in history and different trades, like the fossil smuggling trade is a real thing. Maybe that’s showing how ignorant I am, but it is kind of a niche area, you know?

I mean, I didn’t know that there were aluminum wars, let alone a fossil smuggling trade. That sounds fascinating.

Yeah, there’s a show or a movie there, about what happened in Siberia in like the seventies and eighties. Just extraordinary things. There’s so many stories in the world, you know, when you’re making a backstory for a character. I think that’s one of the funnest things, is that you get to learn about something that you never knew about. So it’s a fun education.

One of the great aspects of the film is the emphasis on animatronic dinosaurs. Did you get to have some good interactions with them?

You know, I didn’t, and I regret not making it a priority to go to the warehouse where they had like a hundred people working to make these gorgeous, gorgeous animatronics for the movie. Some other people went, but it was tricky with COVID and everything: There were so many protocols, my stuff just got rushed and I never made it back to the studio to go and see. And it was also like, there’s so much the producers have to deal with at the moment. I didn’t want to be like, “Hey, can you send a car to take me to the animatronic warehouse? I just didn’t wanna get in anyone’s way.

But gosh, the work they did was so beautiful and, you know, a lot of people say they can’t tell which was [animatronic] — I mean, I can though, and I think it was really nice, because it might have… I should ask Colin if to build an animatronic was more expensive than doing VFX. I imagine it would be, maybe, but the effort that they went to, to create that, was just amazing.

Dichen Lachman Interview
Dichen Lachman Interview

Jurassic World Dominion (Universal Studios)

So, having seen the Netflix film The Bubble, I’m curious if you have any thoughts on it.

Oh my gosh. I really want to see it. I met Judd [Apatow] at a Severance thing recently, for the finale, and I asked him, “How much did you talk to Colin about the movie?” And he was like, “You know, we had a few chats.” I think Colin took him to the hotel that we lived in, and he got a few like little anecdotes about you know, living in the hotel.

I mean, obviously The Bubble is way broader than what actually happened, but I think the personal trainer, he definitely based that on Ash, the trainer in the hotel. Because we weren’t allowed to leave, it was like, well, this guy can train you and it’s up to you. But i took him up on it because I was getting a little stir crazy during the day, and I was like, well, at least I could break up my day with like a gym session and whatever. So I think that the idea for having a personal trainer in the movie was definitely taken from like what actually happened.

There’s a few other things that people have mentioned to me, but I really do want to see it. I actually told Judd, “I’m kind of sad I didn’t get to play myself. I was waiting, I heard you were making this movie and I was waiting for the phone to ring.” I’m glad that he was inspired by it, though. [Laughs]

To segue to another recent project, it was great to also see you appear in Severance.

It was funny. [At one point] on my Skype, it was like Colin, Colin, and then it was Ben Stiller. It was like, oh my God, I have to screengrab this moment. Like, I have these two amazing directors as my most recent calls?

I auditioned for Severance about a month or two after Jurassic — I met Ben and there was some scheduling stuff and I wasn’t sure if I could do it, but then while I was in the hotel bubble on Jurassic, they were like, it’s actually all going to work out and you can play this role.

I was so excited to be a part of that show, even though I hadn’t read anything, because of just who was involved. I mean, it’s just a powerhouse of talent — I always think that working with actors like that makes you better. So I just felt really fortunate.

I got all the scripts for Severance, it was 10 episodes at the time, in the hotel bubble at Jurassic and I just burned through them. Like, obviously with a movie it’s different, but with a TV show, like I just couldn’t put it down. It was like reading an amazing novel. I don’t want to spoil it — Ben still doesn’t want people to spoil the show when you talk about it publicly now, because he’s like, “There’s still so many people that haven’t seen it.” But it’s such a great show.

Dichen Lachman Interview
Dichen Lachman Interview

Severance (Apple TV+)

To wrap things up, I first discovered your work through Dollhouse, and I wanted to ask what it was like having a project like that at the beginning of your career. What kind of impact did it have? Does it still come up a fair amount for you?

Absolutely. If it wasn’t for Dollhouse, I don’t think I’d even be sitting here. Not only was it an amazing opportunity as an actor to play all those different characters and with all those incredible people, but I’m so grateful to have had that experience. People love that show still, and it was one of the best experiences of my life. We were like a family, and the whole family is like my extended family in Los Angeles. I’ll always be so grateful for that experience because it prepared me, I think, for a lot of what was to come.

There were so many great writers on that show, and a lot of the writers on that show hired me on other things. And that’s one lesson for young actors, is always be good to work with, because then people do remember when you are, and they do call you when you are right for something. I can’t tell you how many times that has happened. I mean, I can probably draw a line back to Dollhouse for like 80% of the things that I’ve done, because they’re writers on other shows now, or were fans of the show and as they worked their way up, they were like, I was always such a fan of Dollhouse. So yes, it made a huge impact on my life.

It’s funny, I remember seeing you pop up on Torchwood: Miracle Day and going, oh, that’s right, [Dollhouse executive producer] Jane Espenson is working on this.

Right. That was Jane. And also John Levey, the casting director, that was my first job I got with him. He’s been like a guardian angel in my life too. Torchwood was just such a fun, fun thing to do. I’ve been so lucky. I got to be part of that little Doctor Who world. I mean, I know it’s not Doctor Who, but…

I mean, it’s officially part of that universe.

An extension of it. Yeah. [Laughs]

Jurassic World Dominion begins streaming on Peacock starting Friday, September 2nd.

Jurassic World Dominion Star Dichen Lachman on Ruling the Dinosaur Black Market
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