The Day of the Jackal’s Lashana Lynch wanted realistic chase scenes

After stunt-heavy roles in “The Woman King” and “No Time to Die,” Lashana Lynch was ready for something less physically demanding. “I’m really proud of that moment (doing all her own stunts in ‘The Woman King’), but I didn’t want to do it again anytime soon,” she admits. So when she was offered crime caper “The Day of the Jackal” — while she was still shooting “Bob Marley: One Love,” an experience she describes as “calm, calm, wonderful” without the stunts — it wasn’t an immediate yes.

“It took me a while to read the episodes, not because I didn’t think they would be good, but because I was very conscious — hyper-conscious — about affecting the legacy that is part of ‘No Time’ to Die,” which was just such an amazing, huge deal for the world,” says Lynch Black. “But then I read the first three chapters and was completely drawn in.”

In “The Day of the Jackal,” Lynch plays Bianca, a detective obsessively hunting an enigmatic assassin known only as the Jackal (played by Eddie Redmayne). In addition to the fast-paced story, Lynch was drawn to explore “the psychology of women in service with a fine tooth comb, and also how they balance being a good person, a good wife, a good mother, making good choices in order to maintain a lovely life.”

While the series, which launched in the UK on Sky on November 7 and premiered on the Peacock on Thursday night, has its fair share of action scenes, Lynch made the decision early on that she would not be doing her own stunts this time around. . “Respectfully – I love the stunt industry and I think they should all be celebrated, especially women,” she says.

Instead, Lynch focused on acting and producing, having boarded the project as an exec producer alongside Redmayne. The dual roles meant she found herself thinking about scenes in a new way. “I split my brain between what’s going to feel good in my body and what’s going to feel good as an actor, but also how things are going to edit together,” she recalls. “What music would go best with this? What will the audio sound like? Is the microphone going to pick up all the heavy breathing or is there going to be a lot of ADR? There are so many things going on in my mind that I just wanted everything to be as rich in experience as possible, both for us and the audience.”

Part of her vision for the series was to keep it grounded. “I’ve done guns before, and it’s tough, but at every given moment I was like, ‘Gosh, these chases really have to read as completely realistic,'” Lynch says. “And I don’t want anyone to glorify anything or think that these are two superheroes running around with the perfect chase. It was the complications – both in the story, but also in the fact that I wanted to do better for the industry at every moment. It is a great weight to put in every moment.”

Despite being done with stunt work (at least for now), the actress is still open to returning to the Bond franchise, reprising her role as 007 agent Nomi, who was set to take over from Daniel Craig in the end of “No Time to Die” .” “If there’s enough story there that makes sense, then I’m sure the audience will be able to have a really cool experience seeing Nomi again,” she says. “But I really don’t know. It’s left up in the air.”

Has she heard anything from Bond producers Eon about what’s happening with the next installment? “I haven’t. I really haven’t,” Lynch says earnestly. wanted information. I really don’t! Sincerely. But I’m just as fascinated as everyone else.”