Star Wars and Star Trek actor Simon Pegg jokes about JJ Abrams' *very* relaxed casting process
Simon Pegg seems like he's been in just about every massive franchise going – Star Wars, Star Trek and Mission: Impossible to name a few – and a big link between these projects is director J.J. Abrams.
Pegg and Abrams have now worked together on multiple projects including three rebooted Star Trek movies, in which Pegg plays engineer Montgomery 'Scotty' Scott, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which sees him take on a cameo role under a LOT of prosthetics as an unfriendly alien.
Pegg and Abrams clearly have a good working relationship and the actor has now joked to BBC Radio 1's film critic Ali Plumb that the reason Abrams keeps casting him is because he couldn't be bothered to audition anyone else.
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The actor revealed that his first contact with Abrams was via a phone call after the director had enjoyed Pegg's 2004 zombie comedy Shaun of the Dead.
"Edgar (Wright) and I were writing Hot Fuzz and the call came from upstairs," he said. "I said 'hello' and he just sort of said that he'd liked Shaun of the Dead and ... 'do you want to come and be in Mission: Impossible 3?'"
"(It's) very how he is, he's very much sort of let's do it right here kind of attitude," he continued. "The same thing with Star Trek, it was an email, it wasn't even a casting or anything. It was just like, I think he got fed up of looking! He'd worked with me before so he thought, 'Oh we'll get him'".
He then joked that Abrams probably thinks, "Just get Pegg, Pegg'll do it, he'll do anything'", adding: "So I said, 'Oh alright, let's do that'."
Related: Star Wars' John Boyega on post-franchise "wins"
Pegg recently shared a disappointing update on the next Star Trek instalment, saying that despite a fourth film being greenlit he doesn't know what is going to happen with it.
"We've lost momentum," he said. "I think losing Anton (Yelchin, who played Chekov) was a huge blow to our little family, and our enthusiasm to do another one might have been affected by that. So, I don't know."
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is out now on, , , and digital download. It will land on Disney+, Sky Cinema and NOW TV on May 4.
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Source: www.digitalspy.com