“Ozark” Emmy winner Julia Garner is opening up about her introduction into the Marvel Cinematic Universe in this summer’s “Fantastic Four: First Steps,” in which she plays the chrome, surfboard-riding Silver Surfer. However, the role is different from the cosmic character previously seen in 2007’s “Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer” in that she plays the female version, Shalla-Bal.
Garner spoke to Entertainment Weekly about her character, which finally appeared in the new “Fantastic Four” trailer that dropped last week. She recalled meeting director Matt Shakman to talk about the movie at a restaurant in Burbank, but the conversation was so wide-ranging that she thought she’d be passed over for the job.
“I was confused because I was like, ‘Wait, isn’t the Silver Surfer a man?’ I was just like, ‘Okay, well, I’ll play anything.’ I was a very big fan of Matt’s, so there was already, in my mind, like, ‘I should probably meet with Matt Shakman because he’s a very smart director and I love his work.’ And then he was explaining to me that it’s actually Shalla-Bal and that whole thing,” she said. “He wasn’t telling me a whole bunch about the movie, but we were talking a lot about the 1960s. Our meeting went all over the place, and I thought I wasn’t actually going to get the part because the meeting was all over the place. I was like, ‘I don’t know how he will hire me for this job.’ I mean, we were talking about communism, brutalist architecture, all this stuff. And then they were like, ‘You got it.’ I was like, ‘Wait, what?’ So I think that we vibed, but you never know, basically, is what I’m saying.”
Like the Marvel comics, Shalla-Bal is the herald of Galactus, a planet-devouring behemoth who is voiced by Ralph Ineson in the movie. She’s covered from head to toe in shiny silver and flies around on a cosmic surfboard, which means Garner had to do motion capture for the first time in her career.
“That was my first time doing that technology, and it was crazy,” she said. “It was such a surreal experience. It was wild. Normally, last looks would be hair and makeup, and then all of a sudden, it was just wires.”
She also did a lot of yoga to practice all her surfboarding scenes: “I wish it were as cinematic as it is in everybody’s mind, thinking it’s a ‘Rocky’ training. I wish I could say that. I just did my basic exercising, some Pilates, and yoga. I did a lot of yoga just because I knew that I was going to be doing positions all day surfing. But it was weird — I was in motion-cap, but I mean, I wasn’t eating donuts and hamburgers every day and not moving.”
Even though she hasn’t seen her final look from the movie, Garner teased that her Silver Surfer will please Marvel fans and be distinct from past versions due to the MCU movie’s retro-futuristic tone.
“I just thought it was so cool. It kind of oddly looked like … well, I don’t want to say fashion-y, but you could totally see it on, I felt like, a runway, which is something I always notice the best. The costume has to be aesthetically pleasing to the eye, especially with Marvel. People love that,” she said. “At the end of the day, it is a comic book. I’m excited to see it — I really haven’t seen anything besides the trailer and some mockup scenes, so it’s going to be interesting.”
