Leslie Grace Calls BATGIRL Movie "Insane" and She's in Talks With Filmmakers for Possible Sequels

Leslie Grace, star of the upcoming DC film Batgirl, is teasing the film to fans, saying it’s “insane” and that she’s already in talks with the filmmakers about the possibility of future sequels. After spending months overseas shooting the film for HBO, Grace is home, and she sat down with Variety to dish about the experience.

In the movie co-directed by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, Grace takes on the role of Barbara Gordon/Batgirl, with a cast that includes J.K. Simmons as her father, Commissioner Jim Gordon; and Brendan Fraser as the villain, Firefly. Michael Keaton is making his return to the role of Batman 30 years after his first appearance as the Caped Crusader.

When asked about playing the iconic DC character, Grace said:

“She definitely exceeds what I thought. I had to summon up some things in me that I didn’t even know were there. It was an incredible learning experience to be on set with also action veterans like Brendan Fraser, and soak up it all up. It was so hard because he’s our villain and I’m not supposed to like but he’s such a huge teddy bear. He is one of the nicest people that I’ve ever met. In our fight sequences the way he would just hit marks, it came from all of his experience. You can’t improvise that kind of experience. There’s some crazy stuff that happens. There’s lots of fire because as everyone knows by now, he plays Firefly. There’s crazy fire. There’s crazy stunts, crazy drops. She’s a biker chick, so you’re going to see her do a bunch of badassery.”

She went on to describe what it was like when Michael Keaton walked on set, and how she felt working closely with J.K. Simmons, saying:

“It was wild for everyone. Our directors were like two little kids. They’re legit Batman nerds openly. He’s Batman, man! I couldn’t even believe that I was sharing space with Batman. I want to say more, but I can’t. It was insane, surreal, incredible. It was the stuff of dreams really. And J.K. Simmons playing my dad. That’s my pop. I was so nervous because all I could hear in my head was his voice in ‘Whiplash.’ Like what would he do and say if I didn’t get something right? [Laughs]. Then we became the best of friends. And just he told me all his great stories of starting out and being a waiter and working in a pizza shop and trying to be an actor and doing theater.”

When asked about the future of her character, and possible sequel(s), Grace said:

“[Laughs] We got to see this first one first. But there’s definitely some talks about what it could be. I’ve seen some of what we’ve shot, obviously in the playback and stuff like that, and it’s insane. We’ve already been talking about where do we take this from here because there’s so much that happens in this film. There are a lot of different themes in the plot that we touch on. It’s not just the action. There’s a love story. There’s this father-daughter relationship. There’s looking at the world through a lens that isn’t just black and white and seeing the color and the spectrum between things.”

It sounds like this is going to be a pretty fun movie! It’s always interesting with DC properties. You have to watch them to see if they are going to be amazing, or total crap. I hope this one is great! Batgirl is set to hit HBO Max later this year.