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Gal Gadot: 'I will tell the world the real Cleopatra story'
The Israeli actress on why she faced off a backlash against her playing the Egyptian queen
July 13, 2023 12:57
The Israeli actress on why she faced off a backlash against her playing the Egyptian queen
July 13, 2023 12:57I love the sheer chutzpah of Israeli actress Gal Gadot, who just six years ago was contemplating giving up her acting dreams but is now one of the most bankable stars on the planet.
When the face of Wonder Woman announced plans three years ago to make a film about Queen Cleopatra she received a furious backlash — mainly because she was deemed the wrong nationality and, even worse, an Ashkenazi Jew.
A rival Netflix drama documentary project, made by Jada Pinkett Smith with a black Cleopatra was thought to have meant those plans had hit the dust, particularly when her long-running colleague, Wonder Woman filmmaker Patty Jenkins announced she would no longer be directing.
Gal Gadot arriving at the world premiere of Barbie (Photo: Getty Images)
But Gal has just revealed that work continues on making the film. There is a new director in place and plans are afoot to start filming soon.
“If Wonder Woman is the imaginary strong female leader, Cleopatra’s actually the real one,” Gal told Vogue Hong Kong.
“All I ever saw in regards to Cleopatra from the film, was that she was this seductive woman who had an affair with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony. But the truth is, there’s so much more to her.
"This woman was so ahead of her time. Egypt and what Egypt was back then, was still futuristic to where we are today.
“I can’t say too much. But to me, I’m so passionate to tell her story and to bring justice to this character and her legacy, and celebrate her and her legacy.
"We have a beautiful script and I cannot wait to share this story with the world and change the narrative of Cleopatra simply being a seductor.”
Her chutzpah is in ignoring her detractors at a time when racial politics could not be more fashionable and divisive.
While Gal has been accused of being too white to play Cleopatra, there was ironically also a huge backlash over the Netflix version with the British mixed-race actor Adele James coming under fire for being too black.
In fact, one Egyptian lawyer has pledged to sue Netflix for $2billion dollars while an Egyptian television channel vowed to create its own show using a light-skinned actress.
Cleopatra was the last Hellenistic ruler of the Macedonian-led Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt and scholars believe she was predominantly of Macedonian Greek ancestry with some possible Persian DNA too.
Gal says that there had been a plan to find a Macedonian actress but they struggled, adding that as an Israeli there is no reason why she shouldn’t play the ruler of a country that her own borders.
But quite what Egyptians and the race activists will think of her pronouncement is, perhaps, another question.
In the meantime, you can see the actor — who recently became the first Israeli to win a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame — on Netflix as top spy Rachel Stone in next month’s eagerly anticipated AI thriller Heart of Stone.
Quentin Tarantino may not be Jewish but he lives in Israel, after falling in love and marrying singer Daniella Pick, and created the wonderful Inglourious Basterds.
Quentin Tarantino (Photo by Bruno Cherbit)
