Emma Watson and Miles Teller almost starred as the leads in La La Land, but the parts ultimately went to Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling instead. In a new interview with SiriusXM’s Town Hall on Friday, March 10, Watson opened up about why she wasn’t cast in Damien Chazelle’s Oscar-nominated movie musical.
“It’s one of these frustrating things where names get attached to projects very early on as a way to kind of build anticipation or excitement for something that’s coming before anything is really actually agreed or set in stone,” the 26-year-old actress explained before clarifying that she had already committed to her leading role in the upcoming live-action adaption of Beauty and the Beast.
“[Beauty and the Beast] wasn’t a movie I could just sort of step into,” Watson continued. “I knew I had horse training, I knew I had dancing, I knew I had three months of singing ahead of me and I knew I had to be in London to really do that. This wasn’t a movie I could just kind of parachute into. I knew I had to do the work, and I had to be where I had to be. So, you know, scheduling conflict-wise, it just didn’t work out.”
Stone, 28, won the Oscar for Best Actress for her role in La La Land.
Though Watson couldn’t step into both Belle’s and Mia Dolan’s shoes, she’s excited to see a resurgence of musicals on the big screen. “I’m so thrilled that musicals are so celebrated at the moment!” the Harry Potter star told Town Hall. “They seem to be back in the zeitgeist, and people are kind of celebrating and loving music and singing and dancing again. I thought [La La Land] was wonderful. It’s lovely.”
As Us Weekly previously reported, La La Land director Chazelle, 32, addressed the last-minute casting change in a 2016 interview with Uproxx. “The casting of this movie during the six years it took to get made went through lots of permutations, and it’s true there was a moment where Emma Watson and Miles Teller were doing it,” he explained. “And neither of those casting things wound up lasting or working out.”
Beauty and the Beast hits theaters on Friday, March 17.
