‘We must have killed 100 zombies’: Lily James nails it in Pride and Prejudice update
British actress known for playing Lady Rose in Downton Abbey initially thought putting zombies in Jane Austen sounded terrible, but soon warmed to sword wielding and roundhouse kicks for her role in Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
Lily James once counted herself among those shocked, positively shocked, that a movie was under way injecting zombies into Jane Austen’s classic 1813 novel Pride and Prejudice.
To add injury to insult, the Downton Abbey and Cinderella actress was asked to star in the corpse-infested enterprise.
“When that call came, I thought that this all sounded terrible. They put zombies in Pride and Prejudice? I’m British; being obsessed with Jane Austen is a birthright,” says James. “And then I realised I was just being ignorant. The script was brilliant.”
That was a very bad day for zombies.
James, 26, who had wielded nothing more than tea cups and hairbrushes as Lady Rose on Downton Abbey, transformed into a killing machine for Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, based on Seth Grahame-Smith’s best-selling novel. Her feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet, called Liz in the revamped work, wields a lethal sword and dagger on zombie foes.
Here’s someone with the chops to do Jane Austen dialogue with emotion and athletic enough to do it while kicking zombie butt. Lily is the complete package.