‘Ahsoka’ Star Eman Esfandi Fulfilled His Own ‘Star Wars’ Prophecy: “I’m Going to Play Ezra”
[This story contains spoilers for Ahsoka.]
Ahsoka star Eman Esfandi called his own shot.
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When Rosario Dawson’s Ahsoka Tano first appeared in live-action on The Mandalorian season two and voiced her intention to find the villainous Grand Admiral Thrawn (Lars Mikkelsen), Ezra Bridger’s own jump to live-action immediately became a near-inevitability for die-hard Star Wars fans. The already-great odds increased even more when Dawson’s spinoff series, Ahsoka, was announced shortly thereafter in December 2020, with longtime Star Wars creator and George Lucas apprentice Dave Filoni at the helm. This meant that Filoni would likely introduce not only Ezra and Thrawn into the live-action fold, but also plenty more of his beloved animated characters from the likes of Star Wars Rebels and Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
As a result, the role of the long-lost Jedi, Ezra, became one of the most coveted parts in town, and six months before the casting process even started, Esfandi told his representatives how things would play out.
“I emailed my agent and manager six months prior to my audition and was like, ‘Hey, when they cast for Ezra Bridger, I’m going to play him. So use these pictures,’” Esfandi tells The Hollywood Reporter.
When a cryptic audition came up six months later for a character named “Riz,” Esfandi and his team quickly decoded that it was for Ezra. And similar to his co-star Natasha Liu Bordizzo and her live-action take on the animated character of Sabine Wren, Esfandi was cast off his self-tape alone that included at least one Top Gun scene. So he fulfilled his own prophecy from six months earlier in a rather streamlined process.
At the end of Star Wars Rebels, Ezra sacrificed everything to keep Thrawn, and himself by extension, trapped in another galaxy where the evil Grand Admiral could be neutralized. Consequently, Ezra missed out on all the events of the original Star Wars trilogy. So, upon Ezra and Sabine’s dramatic reunion on Ahsoka, Esfandi and Bordizzo would eventually have a scene during the seventh episode where Sabine brings Ezra up to speed on everything that happened during his extended absence. The added wrinkle to their exchange is that Sabine was also updating Esfandi himself on everything he’d overlooked so far.
“I wasn’t a Star Wars person before the show. I just didn’t grow up on it. But after we shot the show, I inhaled all of it for six months,” Esfandi admits. “So, when Sabine was filling Ezra in, I also didn’t know much about it. Once I got to know everything, it just made that scene twice as funny. I was like, ‘Oh my God, that was how they filled Ezra in? That’s hilarious.’”
Ahsoka season one ends with Ezra and Sabine essentially trading places. She’s now stuck in another galaxy with Ahsoka, and Ezra has returned home, reuniting with Rebels friend Hera Syndulla (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). And while Ezra is aware that Thrawn has also come back to the familiar galaxy that he sacrificed so much to protect, he’s not yet aware that Sabine’s deal with the enemy opened the door for all of this to happen.
With a potential season two still on the horizon, as well as Filoni’s announced film that will someday bring this current Disney+ Star Wars storyline to a conclusion, Esfandi is perfectly fine if his tenure ends with that future film.
“If I do a second season, I’ll be happy. If we also do a movie, I’ll be so happy, and I would never need more than that,” Esfandi says. “I’m like Harrison Ford in that way where I don’t need Ezra’s story to just live forever. I’d rather his story be concluded in the most appropriate way for his character. So if it ends at the movie, I’ll wash my hands and thank God and move on.”
Below, during a recent spoiler conversation with THR, Esfandi also discusses Ezra’s likely reaction to Sabine’s actions that ultimately restored the threat of Thrawn. Then he looks back on a day during stunt training where he didn’t recognize a “statuesque man” who wowed him with his lightsaber skills.
Well, let’s start at the beginning. I presume you made a tape for what was considered to be a secretive project at the time. Did you have to perform a Top Gun scene like Natasha Liu Bordizzo did?
It was actually the exact same scene that Natasha had. It was the same scene from Top Gun, but I had never seen Top Gun, so I didn’t know what the scene was from at the time. I just knew they were dummy sides.
Have you now seen Top Gun?
Yeah, we started watching Top Gun, and I forgot about [the audition scene] until the actual scene came on. And I was like, “Guys! Guys! One sec! Did you know … ?” And some of them were like, “That’s really cool.” And some were like, “Oh, okay.” (Laughs.) So it was cooler to me, I think.
Was your performance on tape remotely similar to Ezra? Can you see, in hindsight, what they saw?
For sure, and I knew I was auditioning for Ezra. I was just like, “Okay, this is Ezra.” I only did one take for each of the scenes, and it just felt right. It felt natural. It felt like Ezra was really there, and I sent it in feeling pretty confident about them seeing Ezra right away. And they did.
Natasha didn’t know she was auditioning for Sabine, so did you literally know you were auditioning for Ezra? Or did you just have a strong hunch?
Technically, it was a hunch, but I treat my hunches as literally knowing things. I emailed my agent and manager six months prior to my audition and was like, “Hey, when they cast for Ezra Bridger, I’m going to play him. So use these pictures.” And then, six months later, they were like, “Hey, we think this [audition] is the [Ezra] role.” And I was like, “Oh, this is him. Cool.” The anonymous sides tracked with Disney, so did the character description, and then the character’s name was Riz. I was like, “Okay, they’re probably looking for someone who looks like Riz [Ahmed].” So we were all pretty sure that it was him. We were like, “Yeah, that’s got to be Ezra.”
So it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Yes, very much.
Natasha was pretty much cast off her tape alone, which is quite rare. There were basically no callbacks or added hurdles. Did you also have minimal hoops to jump through?
Yeah, they offered the role the next day, so it was the same thing. It was straight off the tape, which, as you know, is not super normal for TV series. So that was really flattering and also affirming. It just felt like, “Okay, they know what they want and they see that in me.” And they saw it in Tash, too. So it felt good.
You had a ton of backstory already available to you through Rebels, and Natasha treated it as a memory bank that she could draw on as needed. But I read that you opted not to get too wrapped up in his animated past. How come?
I already felt like I had a discourse with Ezra as a character, and there was so much information about Ezra online as if he was a public figure. You could search someone in history for a biopic you’re doing, and you would never get to see them alive, but you’d read everything about them and their story. So I treated Ezra that way. I read about his family, his parents, his upbringing and his master. So I read everything about Ezra and watched other surrounding, adjacent things.
I just didn’t want to watch actual young Ezra, because I didn’t want the voice to get too locked into my head and throat. I didn’t want to be too hokey about trying to copy a certain physicality and mannerisms that are technically from an animated show. We’re regular live-action, and I have to move like a regular human and not like a cartoon. And so I thought it would get too cartoony if I watched Rebels, as opposed to just treating him like a regular character that you look up all the information of and then embody it as your physicality embodies it naturally.
What struck you most about the character? What did you find to be most actable?
Ezra’s levity was really charming, but I shied away from being silly and goofy at first just because there’s a stigma. The first versions of Brown men in TV or film were either terrorists or the incapable and weak comedic relief characters. So I always was like, “I’m not going to do that, because I don’t want to get boxed in there and have to fight that stereotype.” It’s similar to not wanting to do terrorist roles.
But Ezra is super silly and goofy, and it was so light and charming. It’s a hopeful energy that he has, and it relieved all of that from me. I was like, “Oh, no, I can totally let that side out, and it will be really fun.” So it’s much more fun to be light and optimistic and carefree, and I’d say that was the most enjoyable thing about Ezra that was actable. It’s opened that up in my own existence, which has been really nice.
When Ezra first appears as a hologram in episode one, it’s a younger version without the beard. Did they shave your face at the very end of the season just for that one piece?
Yeah, they just waited until I shot all my other scenes to shave my face and put me in that bit. They knew that once they shaved my face, they couldn’t go back. It was also refreshing to know that I wasn’t going to do any reshoots. They were like, “You’re definitely not doing reshoots. We’re shaving your face.” And I was like, “Thanks, Dave.”
“I knew I could count on you.” What’s the story behind Ezra and Sabine’s first proper reunion scene?
We got together with Dave and Jennifer [Getzinger], the director, to run through the scene and see what the chemistry would be like. But as soon as we got together for the rehearsal, both Dave and Jennifer joked, “Okay, you don’t even have to practice this. You two already have the chemistry of these characters, and we’re just going to let you guys do it.” So Natasha and I were like, “Great!” Neither of us really needed or wanted a rehearsal too much, and they didn’t feel like we needed one either. There’d also been a lack of communication between Ezra and Sabine anyway, so the less we speak, the better or the fresher it could be. And then, on the day, it came pretty quick. A few takes in, it felt very locked in and very natural.
That was a funny day, because Natasha had been telling me that there wasn’t a lot of improv in the stuff that they’d already done, and I love improv. And I was like, “Oh, really?” And she was like, “Yeah, it’s just by nature of the lines and the setups with the shots.” So I was like, “Oh, okay, but maybe they’ll let us.” And when we got to meeting and saying hello and whatever else we wanted to say, they were like, “Improv!” And I was like, “Sick!” So we improvised a lot, and it was more so that the energy of what we just improvised was still there in the next takes. So we improvised like three or four takes, and then we reeled it back into the natural lines. And so you can feel how loose and free it is.
Did any of that improv make the final cut?
Yeah, it was when Sabine touches Ezra’s outfit, and that led into: “I see my friends found you.” That happened differently every time, and that’s the one that landed.
Ezra sacrificed his life and happiness to keep Thrawn (Lars Mikkelsen) at bay in another galaxy, and now, Sabine has undone that sacrifice at great risk to the primary galaxy. She kept dodging the subject when asked, but what do you expect his reaction to be once he knows the full extent of Sabine’s actions?
I think he’ll forgive her. He’ll understand what it would’ve felt like to be in her position, especially after hearing about her family on Mandalore and how everyone that she cared for was gone. So I think it’ll resonate. He was a kid all on his own for a really long time until he was found. He did stuff that he doesn’t necessarily regret, but wishes he hadn’t done. He followed the Dark Side of the Force. He went with Darth Maul and opened a Sith holocron at a Sith temple. He did a lot of things to try to help and to try to get things for his family and the people he loved and the planet he loved. So he’s not a stranger to following your intuition in a way that maybe isn’t for the best, but feels most satisfying.
And either way, I’m sure he’ll also have some sort of feeling that it all played out the way it was meant to play out. So, even though her actions seem counterintuitive and work against everything Ezra sacrificed himself for, he has such a good connection to the Force that he would understand it was meant to be.
Ezra has been gone for so long that he missed the entire original Star Wars trilogy, and he had to hear about it third-hand from Sabine.
(Laughs.)
Did part of you want to play his reactions even bigger given how dramatic that story is?
Yes and no. It’s a silly scene for Ezra to be filled in like that. Ezra is filled in on the Original Trilogy, the most influential trilogy in history, while on a little pod, and it’s so casual. (Laughs.) “Oh, that’s what happened? Crazy!” I thought that was so funny, and I just wanted to leave it as is. I didn’t have any thoughts on it. I thought it was meta-ridiculous funny that Ezra was filled in that way on everybody’s favorite trilogy, everyone’s favorite part of the franchise.
I wasn’t a Star Wars person before the show. I just didn’t grow up on it. But after we shot the show, I inhaled all of it for six months, and that just made the scene even funnier. So, when Sabine was filling Ezra in, I also didn’t know much about it. So I was like, “Oh, that’s hilarious. I really don’t know much about this world.” So once I got to know everything, it just made that scene twice as funny. I was like, “Oh my God, that was how they filled Ezra in? That’s hilarious.” It was silly and nice.
Ezra initially turned down a lightsaber to Force fight instead, but you still got plenty of lightsaber time in the end. How early did they get you involved in lightsaber and fight choreography?
I started fight rehearsal about a month before I shot, and at first, it was pretty basic stuff just once a week. They have to be careful and walk actors through physicality, because they don’t know everyone’s skill level and they don’t want anyone to get hurt. But I got lucky that one of the stunt people, Bruce Inaba, was tasked with teaching me alone. Everyone else was so busy with all the fights that they were choreographing. He’s a little younger than me, and he’s a ninja. He’s one of [fight coordinator] Ming Qiu’s literal prodigies, and she’s taught him since he was nine or something. He’s now 25, I think. So I was like, “Bruce, man, you’ve got to help me out. Run me through whatever. I’m an athlete. We can’t be teaching me this slowly. You’ve got to get me in the mix.” And he was like, “What have they been teaching you?” And I was like, “Lunging! They’ve been teaching me how to lunge, dude. Come on.” And he was like, “Okay, okay.”
So he ran me through a bunch of more complicated stuff, and then the floodgates opened. Maybe he spoke to Ming or maybe not, but Ming then ran me through a skills assessment. And then Ming said to me, “I want to teach you all your stunts so that you can do them all yourself, ideally. That would be the best thing for the production anyway.” And I was like, “Oh, I thought we were going to do that anyway, but yeah, let’s do that.” And so then it picked up in frequency during that month. It became two times a week, and I would sometimes come in an extra time. But it wasn’t really more than a month of maybe ten sessions. I was still practicing every day at home and doing it all the time.
Ezra kept wanting to go home, and Sabine made sure he got there. But with her still stranded in this other galaxy, what is home without her? I know he’s got a few more friends from Rebels, but doesn’t this home he’s yearned for include all of them?
I think so, yeah. His immediate goal will be finding how to get Ahsoka and Sabine back, just like it was for Sabine and Ahsoka when he went missing. But they’ve now got a much better chance at it, because it’s been done by Ezra, Ahsoka and Thrawn. So it’ll be a prescient goal if season two is green lit and whatnot. Bringing them back would be a huge point, because it is not entirely home until everybody is back and safe.
Even if you don’t work with someone on camera, there’s still a good chance of bumping into them at Manhattan Beach Studios. Was there a day where you were loitering near set and had an unexpected encounter?
My most interesting encounter was when I was first getting to my stunt rehearsals. They have a stunt gym, and one day, as I was stretching and warming up, I just heard two people going crazy with some choreography. You could hear their sticks and their steps. (Esfandi mimics the sound effects.) And I was like, “Whoa!” It was an explosion of choreography that was a minute long, and when I turned to look around, there was this massive, statuesque man in a gray shirt. I didn’t recognize him off the top of my head, but he was just pummeling one of the stunt doubles that I know. So I went over to watch these guys spar up close, and then I realized it was Hayden Christensen. He’s huge. He’s a towering presence, and he’s so good at this. I didn’t know how good he was, because I hadn’t watched the prequels yet. And so I watched someone in real time who’s been put down in history and in this story for being one of the best with a lightsaber. So I was just like, “Oh my God, this guy is so good.” And then they were like, “Eman, you ready to start?” And I’m like, “Yes! When do I get to do that stuff? That’s my goal now.” So it was really exciting to meet him, and for a lot of other people, that would’ve been an even more insane experience. I just didn’t totally recognize him at the time.
Dave Filoni was recently promoted to chief creative officer at Lucasfilm …
(Esfandi pumps his fist in the air.)
And considering that he helped cast you, you’re in a very desirable position moving forward. We know he’s making a movie at some point that will conclude this current Disney+ story. Ahsoka season two, while unofficial, also feels like a foregone conclusion. But do you have some inkling that your tenure will extend beyond both of those potential stories?
Including a potential season two and the film, I think I’ll be very involved. From everything I’ve learned about Star Wars and what’s canon at the moment and the way Dave and everyone seems to be writing and moving forward, I think Ezra plays a very pivotal role, which is exciting. As a human, you’re like, “I get to act! I get to do the thing that I like. I’ll have a job,” but story-wise, it feels correct. It feels like, “Yeah, they should use him. He’d be a really good person to use for this or for that.”
After [the announced movie and a potential Ahsoka season two], I actually don’t know. I don’t know if there’s anywhere else Ezra could live across the universe. Maybe he sacrifices himself again in the movie, and then he is done for. I don’t know. If I do a second season, I’ll be happy. If we also do a movie, I’ll be so happy, and I would never need more than that. I’m like Harrison Ford in that way where I don’t need Ezra’s story to just live forever. I’d rather his story be concluded in the most appropriate way for his character. So if it ends at the movie, I’ll wash my hands and thank God and move on. I also don’t know how I’d feel after doing a potential season two and a movie. I don’t know if I’ll be like, “I want to keep doing Ezra,” and if that’s the case, then maybe I do. I just won’t know yet until I get there. But for these next installments, I will have a very strong presence in those if they happen.
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Ahsoka is now streaming on Disney+.
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