The Amy Winehouse Back To Black biopic is on the way but central star Marisa Abela’s movie audition wasn’t what you may have expected.
Whether you’ve only heard her voice belting out the iconic singles or you’ve listened to everything she’s recorded, you’ll recognize that Amy Winehouse was truly a one-of-a-kind, generational talent. The beloved English singer-songwriter famed for such incredible hits as Rehab, Tears Dry On Their Own, and Black To Black blazed into the industry, broke records, and became an international breakthrough. Tragically, she passed away at 27 on July 23rd 2011. Her story is now being brought to screens in the biopic Back To Black, in which English actress Marisa Abela admirably channels the icon’s incomparable energy.
Marisa Abela’s Amy Winehouse audition for Back To Black was unique
When a movie biopic was announced, fans scrambled to offer their ideal casting but the role ultimately went to Marisa, best known for working on such TV shows as COBRA and Industry.
Of course, playing somebody as remarkably talented and important as Amy would have been a dream gig for so many actresses, so it goes without saying that Marisa would have had hordes of hard competition.
Did she nail the signature look in her audition, complete with a beehive hairdo? No, and that’s what helped her stand out.
Instead of trying to replicate the image everybody associates with the singer, Marisa turned up to her audition not just as the only person without make-up, but also without the big hair that many others would have styled especially for the even bigger audition.
Marisa noticed director Sam Taylor-Johnson and casting director Nina Gold clasp hands as soon as her performance started, giving her confidence she’d taken a wise approach. Paired with a knockout audition in its own right, it got her the part.
“My first instinct was to say ‘No, that’s too much, too huge,'” Marisa said during an interview with Harper’s Bazaar when her agent recommended auditioning for the role. However, she went away and researched Amy’s life and passions before she became the icon adored by millions. It was this fascination and connection to her early years that helped guide Marisa’s unique but winning audition approach.
Marisa Abela felt a major connection to the Back To Black singer
During that research, Marisa began to understand the things that connected her personally to the singer.
“The more I got to know her, the more I felt a major connection to this spiky Jewish girl from London who had a lot to say, and was really quite unafraid,” she told Harper’s Bazaar.
Like Amy, she also grew up in a Jewish household, strengthening her understanding of the London-born artist’s formative years.
“I remembered how I felt when I was young, seeing that woman who was proud and cool, wearing a big Star of David in between a cleavage and a nice bra,” Marisa reminisced fondly about the thoughts stirred in her upon seeing Amy perform. “I understood what a Friday-night dinner would look like in her home, the humor in her family. I loved how effervescent she was, how huge a soul, how she just permeated any room she was in. But also, her relationship to her art form, and wanting to be good. That was the most important thing.”
Wanting to be good. It’s an important point to make because the fandom ever so desperately wants Back To Black to be so too.
Back To Black opens in US theaters on Friday, May 17th 2024.
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