The search is over as Disney have locked down their live-action Mulan star.
Chinese actress Liu Yifei, also known as Crystal Liu has signed on to play the character of Chinese mythology in the live-action version of the 1998 animated movie to be directed by Niki Caro.
“A team of casting directors visited five continents and saw nearly 1,000 candidates for the role, which requires credible martial arts skills, the ability to speak English and the most ineffable requirement of all: star quality. In deference to cultural accuracy, the studio focused on locating an ethnically Chinese young woman to play Hua Mulan, who disguised herself as a man to take her father’s army conscription in fifth-century China.”
Liu, nicknamed “Fairy Sister” by the Chinese public, has been acting since the mid 2000s when she starred in several TV Shows while still studying at the Beijing Film Academy.
She is possibly best know on this side of the globe for having starred in 2008’s The Forbidden Kingdom with legends Jackie Chan and Jet Li, and 2014’s Outcast with, em, legends Nicolas Cage and Hayden Christensen.
Mulans is to be directed by The Zookeeper’s Wife’s Niki Caro and is set to hit screens in 2019.
Source: THR
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