Dominique Thorne made her MCU debut as Riri Williams in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever before landing a main role in Marvel Studios’ Disney+ series Ironheart.
However, if things had gone differently, we might have seen the actress much sooner and in a totally different role.
Thorne actually tried out for the character of Shuri in the first film before Letitia Wright was cast, and she later made her MCU debut as the young prodigy in Letitia Wright sequel.
With Phase 4, the MCU received a plethora of newcomers, including Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams, aka Ironheart.
However, Ironheart was not Thorne’s first tryout for the MCU.
New screen test footage of Thorne acting like the late great Chadwick Boseman during her audition for the part of T’Challa’s younger sister Shuri in the 2018 film Black Panther has surfaced.
Ironheart Star Meets Chadwick Boseman In A New Clip
Disney+ is currently streaming the behind-the-scenes documentary Assembled: The Making of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever from Marvel Studios. Dominique Thorne, who plays Riri Williams, is featured in the documentary.
The test film, which was published on Twitter by user MediaBRMN, shows Boseman and Thorne acting out a scene as the two siblings, with Boseman flashing a nice smile at the actress. After Boseman’s unexpected death in 2020, the character of Shuri was finally given to Letitia Wright, who would go on to play Black Panther in Wakanda Forever.
— MediaBRMN (@BRMNMEDIA) February 8, 2023
Thorne performs several lines of speech from the original Black Panther in the same dialect based on the Xhosa language that the citizens of Wakanda speak, with Boseman seamlessly shifting from grim to cheerful owing to his “sister’s” exploits. This is a scene that will make Marvel fans mourn him even more.
Along with the audition film, there was a voiceover by producer Nate Moore, who explained that while Thorne did not receive the role of Shuri, it was a performance they remembered.
Thorne previously stated that Marvel Studios had called her in order to offer her the part of Ironheart, and we now know why. She additionally stated that when the original 2018 film was released, she was “accepting the reality that [she] didn’t receive the role:
“When the first one came out, where was I in my life? Man, I was accepting the fact that I didn’t get the role.”
The actress auditioned for the role of Shuri several years before Black Panther’s debut, but she found out before she even left the audition that she hadn’t gotten the job. Throne was aware, however, that she was “not where [she] needed to be to take on a picture like that” at the time owing to familial ties, an “academic warzone,” and “all of these dreams” she had.
Dominique Thorne Was The First Choice For The Role Of Riri Williams
Despite the fact that the actress wasn’t selected for the first Black Panther film, the studio did not hesitate to invite her back for the sequel. When the filmmakers chose to cast Riri Williams in the film, Dominique Thorne was their first and only choice for the role, and this time the actress did not have to go through an audition. They said:
“And we liked her and we thought she was smart and she has a great presence and she is funny and she has a lot of attitudes but we remembered that audition, and so when we decided to put Riri Williams into Wakanda Forever she was the first and only call”
Their choice to bring her back worked in the end, as her chemistry with Letitia Wright’s Shuri was among the film’s strengths.
Dominique Thorne will next be seen in the Disney Plus show Ironheart. Ironheart will premiere in late 2023.
