Warning: This interview contains spoilers for Shazam! Fury of the Gods. Grace Caroline Currey still hasn’t met Gal Gadot. “I still haven’t met her or even seen her in person, which I dream of doing someday and getting to be like, ‘Oh, we were in a movie together,’” Currey tells StyleCaster.
Currey made her debut as Mary Bromfield (also known as Mary Marvel or Lady Shazam) in 2019’s Shazam!, DC Films’ movie about a teenager named Billy Batson, who is granted the ability to transform into an adult superhero by an ancient wizard. The film ends with all of Billy’s foster siblings, including Mary, also receiving the ability. Currey reprised her role as Mary in 2023’s Shazam! Fury of the Gods, in which she plays both the teenage and superhero version of Mary. The movie also included a cameo from Gadot, who—after what seemed to be several red herrings early in the film—made a surprise appearance as Wonder Woman in one of the final scenes of Shazam! Fury of the Gods to bring Billy back to life in front of his family.
While Mary—along with Billy’s siblings and foster parents—were in the scene with Wonder Woman, Currey reveals that she and Gadot didn’t film in person and that the scene was directed over Zoom. “They had to film her stuff separately. I think David [F. Sandberg], our director, had to direct her through Zoom,” she said. “I want to say she was in London or somewhere else, and we weren’t able to get her to Georgia. But we got her in the movie.” She continued, “That was the tricky thing with the dynamics of schedules. When you’re trying to get everyone’s schedules in line, you don’t know if you’re going to get them. So the whole whole time we were shooting, it was us whispering, ‘Are we gonna get Gal? Do we know if she’s gonna be in it or not? What’s happening?’”
Image: Courtesy of Nailah Barcelona.
Though she didn’t film with Gadot in person, Currey admits that Wonder Woman’s cameo was one of movie’s most difficult plotlines to keep a secret. “It was hard to keep it a secret, I have to confess,” she said. “I read it in the script, and I immediately texted my brother and told my husband. They can keep a secret. But I was like, ‘Are we allowed? Are we allowed to have Wonder Woman?’ I mean, obviously we are, but it felt like, ‘Gosh, she’s a cool kid, and she’s gonna be in our movie.’”
Ahead, Currey talked to StyleCaster about what it was like to play both Mary’s human and superhero form, the future of the Shazam! movies and DC Comics character she would want to play next.
Image: Courtesy of Nailah Barcelona.
What was it like to be the only actor to film both their character’s human and superhero form?
The tricky thing is they can have the kids and the adults on set at the same time for everyone else because you see different actors, but with me, you got to pick one or the other. The beautiful thing is they rarely are in the scene together, because they’re technically the same person. A lot of the time, the kids were working at a specific window of hours. Then they clock out and the adults clock in for those scenes. Although for this one—for the sequences where you have us being depowered, because that’s a new thing introduced in this where the goddesses are able to use the staff to de-Shazam us—you would have the kids on the sidelines ready to jump in. They’d film the super character fall down and react in a painful way and then they’d run away and the kid would jump in and pop up and go, “Ahh, what happened to me?”
For me, It was change costumes and a makeup wipe. Wipe off all the super makeup. That was a big thing with our changeover. How can we have Mary, from her human form to her superhero form, superhero form to her human form? How can we make this as quick as possible? My makeup artists used a lot of blush on my face for makeup. Then it was like, “Just take that off. Take off the lashes. Take out the hair, and you’re human.”
How do you think Mary and Wonder Woman’s first meeting would go if they interacted more?
I don’t know if you’ve seen that meme of Robert Pattinson where he’s standing there in his Good Time costume, and he’s just staring like in shock. Someone took that and said, “Here’s Mary seeing Wonder Woman.” It could not have been more accurate because I feel like Mary would be just like, “I’m in shock. Is this real? What’s happening?” It’s funny, because when I was doing research for Mary on the first one, I was reading a lot of comics. They meet Wonder Woman, and Wonder Woman’s kind of like, “These kids don’t know what they’re doing.” And she’s kind of grumpy and like, “I had to clean up their mess. What are these kids doing with these powers?” You have this moment where she’s a lot grumpier than I expected, which I found really funny. I always think of that. Mary would be like, “Show me how to be the coolest superhero ever.”
Image: Courtesy of Nailah Barcelona.
What can you say about the future of Shazam!?
Can you imagine if I was just like, “I have all the tea.” I know nothing. I wish I did. I’d like to see more of the Shazam family, because we set up so much fun with the doors. We also had a comic book come out that all the superheroes wrote on and did our own adventure. I got to write Mary’s adventure. My dad did the illustrating. It’s called Shazamily Matters. We explored the doors and all these different universes. I feel like there’s a lot of potential for magic. We got the opportunity to get a little Harry Potter with it with all these doors and worlds.
Would you be OK if this was the last Shazam! movie?
I saw someone put it really beautifully online. They said they loved how we were focused on the characters. We didn’t introduce this like a sequel, this third movie setup. We celebrated the characters we have and we went on the adventure with them. I love what we did. I forever am grateful with the fact that we got a second one. Because when we made the first one, we didn’t know if we got to come back. I got to be in the superhero suit. What a cool thing. I definitely said goodbye to my suit, though, because you just never know. I thought maybe if I did get to do this again, it would be a different suit.
Image: Courtesy of Nailah Barcelona.
If you could play another D.C. Comics character, who would it be?
I’ve been watching the Batman animated series again. It’s my comfort show. Batman just has such great villains. I feel like it’d be fun to be a villain like Calendar Girl. Her storyline is about Hollywood and modeling and it being a tough place. She gets revenge on people. It’s really sad because she wears this mask and she’s afraid of her face. She’s actually beautiful. But she’s got a really cool costume and some beautiful shots. It’s an unexplored character. I think it was an original character to the series that they came up with. I also feel like a female Scarecrow would be cool. We haven’t seen that. The one from The Dark Knight is so good. I feel like you need to go in a completely different direction. I like Hawk Girl. Oh my gosh. Her character design, those wings, her being in therapy. I love Hawk Girl, if we’re gonna talk Justice League. I don’t think I look like Hawk Girl, so I wouldn’t make sense, but she’s cool.
Shazam! Fury of the Gods is in theaters now.
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