Jason Reitman Casually Makes Star Wars an LGBTQ Love Story by Casting Ellen Page as Han Solo

Yesterday we told you about Jason Reitman casting none other than Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul as Luke in his live-read of Empire Strikes Back, but today we’re even more impressed.

Today Entertainment Weekly reported:

Ellen Page will be taking on the part of Han Solo in director Jason Reitman’s live stage-reading of The Empire Strikes Back Thursday night, and Jessica Alba has been cast as Princess Leia—the royal revolutionary who thinks the smuggler is nothing but a “stuck up, half-witted, scruffy-looking Nerfherder.”

This is the coolest of the cool.

“In casting Han, the most important thing is: Who has the most interesting, ironic approach to life? And when I think of that, I think of Ellen Page. She’s a small human being who has the energy to fill Madison Square Garden,” said Reitman. “For Leia, I just wanted to find an actress who was beautiful and also had the ability to be tough and funny, and I’ve seen Alba do all of that. And I needed somebody who would have chemistry with Ellen.”

As to this being a somewhat groundbreaking pairing for the Star Wars universe, Reitman only said this: “Chemistry is chemistry, whether it be between a man and a woman, two women, or two men.”

Well put. The rest of the cast includes J.K. Simmons as Darth Vader, Stephen Merchant as C3P0, Dennis Haysbert for Lando, and Kevin Pollack as Yoda. We’re sorry we won’t be in Los Angeles to see it.

(Page image via s_bukley / Shutterstock.com)

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Jill Pantozzi

Jill Pantozzi is a pop-culture journalist and host who writes about all things nerdy and beyond! She’s Editor in Chief of the geek girl culture site The Mary Sue (Abrams Media Network), and hosts her own blog “Has Boobs, Reads Comics” (TheNerdyBird.com). She co-hosts the Crazy Sexy Geeks podcast along with superhero historian Alan Kistler, contributed to a book of essays titled “Chicks Read Comics,” (Mad Norwegian Press) and had her first comic book story in the IDW anthology, “Womanthology.” In 2012, she was featured on National Geographic’s "Comic Store Heroes," a documentary on the lives of comic book fans and the following year she was one of many Batman fans profiled in the documentary, "Legends of the Knight."

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