
InEmpire’s first look at Taylor-Joy, 27, as the character Furiosa in the upcomingMad Max: Fury RoadprequelFuriosa: A Mad Max Saga, the outlet reported that while Taylor-Joy and Theron, 48, still have not met in person, theMonsteractress approves of Taylor-Joy taking the part in order to portray the character at younger ages.
“She’s been so classy and kind in letting me go and do it,” Taylor-Joy said. “But I feel very lucky that, from the second I read the script, I just knew this person. I felt so fiercely protective over Furiosa, and fiercely protective of her interests.”
“I was so excited to shave my head,” she added, referring to Theron’s shaved look in the 2015 dystopian action movie. “Then [filmmakerGeorge Miller] saw me in real life, and went, ‘No, we can’t!’ ”
While speaking withEmpire, Miller, 79, noted that he originally wrote the screenplay forFuriosa— which he described as an “odyssey” that tracks the 15 years of its title character’s life leading up toFury Road— before he made the 2015 movie that also starredTom Hardy.
Anya Taylor-Joy in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
“She said, ‘Please, George, can we make this first?’ ” Miller said of Theron’s initial reaction to readingFuriosa’s script while preparing to play the character years ago. “It was the first time I realized that there’s something really strong in this story.”
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Theron has remained diplomatic about Taylor-Joy taking on herMad Maxrole while the movie has been in production in recent years. “Listen, I’m not mad about [aMad Maxprequel]. One of the greatest f—— actresses is picking up something that I only imagined,” she toldThe Hollywood Reporterin December 2022, adding, “It’s always tricky,” when asked if Taylor-Joy had reached out to her yet about playing the same role.
Anya Taylor-Joy and Charlize Theron.Theo Wargo/Getty; Kevin Winter/Getty

“Who wants to pick up the phone and say, like, ‘Hey, we’re going to go do this without you,’ " she said at the time. “No one wants to do that. So, I totally get that. And I love George. I know I’ll talk to him again. I think it was just too hard.”
Tayloy-Joywrapped filming on theFuriosamovieback in October 2022; she wrote on Instagram at the time that making the movie helped make “me tougher than I ever thought I could be.”
Furiosa: A Mad Max Sagais in theaters May 24.
source: people.com