Getting cast in a Star Wars show straight out of drama school is quite a start to an actor’s career. Elizabeth Dulau, who plays spy Kleya Marki in Andor on Disney+, enjoyed every minute, as well you would. “Every day on that set was a joy,” she says.
For her first on-screen role, she couldn’t have asked for a better partner than Stellan Skarsgård as Luthen Rael, the spider at the centre of the Rebel Alliance’s web. “He really took me under his wing,” she says.
Before Dulau’s final audition, he insisted on seeing her for coffee. “He made me feel I was going into that audition with a mate,” she says. “What’s wonderful about Stellan is that he takes the work very seriously but not himself.”
Andor itself is a more serious chapter of the Star Wars universe, exploring the backstory of the rebellion against the Empire. While some viewers have been surprised at the darkness it engages with, Dulau understands the iconic space opera franchise is the perfect medium to tackle political themes “This is what sci-fi is about,” she explains. “Taking our world and setting it in a galaxy far, far away so that we can get perspective on ourselves.”
-in-Andor.jpeg?trim=0%2C650%2C0%2C650)
Building Kleya’s character was an involved process, Dulau using a technique she picked up from an acting teacher in her training. “He started talking about using your daydreams as part of your process, and it unlocked a whole new way of working for me,” she explains. “I will daydream about my character’s past lives. I have completely invented scenarios in my own brain about Kleya and Luthen, when Kleya was really little, where she came from. I will spend a long time in those daydreams to the point when they feel like memories.”
The incredible attention to detail from the set and costume crews helped too, she says. Kleya’s signature hairstyle — a kind of reverse victory roll — took three days in the hair and makeup chair to figure out. “It's part of the [Star Wars] job description! Iconic hairdo, please,” Dulau jokes. “Emma Scott did a fantastic job creating that iconic Kleya look.”
Andor sets are even more intricate than the audience realises, she explains, particularly Luthen and Kleya’s art gallery that doubles as their spy base. “There are details there that you would never see on camera,” says Dulau. “All the drawers, you open them up and they're full of stuff that actually works, little gizmos that we can use.”
All the sets are built from scratch in Pinewood but Dulau was also on location at the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias in Valencia, Spain, for three weeks. “It looks as though it was made to be a Star Wars location, it is so stunning,” she says. “There were three consecutive night shoots for a glamorous party scene. Everyone was in their finest space couture, there were robots zipping past, aliens serving drinks. It was just surreal.”
Dulau was one of the few cast members allowed to read the entire script, which meant being sworn to intense secrecy. “My family have been hounding me since the moment I was cast in February 2021 to give them all the details,” she laughs. “I’ve got to hold out just a few more weeks.”
The hotly anticipated second and final season of Andor is midway through airing, with batches of three episodes dropping every week until May 13. For Dulau, it’s time to bid farewell to Kleya. “I find it really hard when I've had this much time with the character,” she says. “Particularly in the way that I work, where I have what feel like very real memories. It makes this character feel like a friend that I have to say goodbye to.”
Was she able to pocket any mementos from the set? “I really wish I'd stolen like a teeny tiny little thing, but I was too much of a goody two shoes,” says Dulau. “There's a pair of earrings that you see Kleya wear in one of the trailers, I could wear those out and about for sure.”
But this is far from the last of Dulau on our screens. “You’ll be seeing me again in Netflix’s House of Guinness,” she says. From Star Wars to stout wars, then.
Andor is streaming now on Disney+
