Star Wars: The Mandalorian Star Pedro Pascal Confirms He Wasn’t Cast Until Filming Already Began

The Mandalorian completely changed many fans’ expectations of the Star Wars universe, between its talented ensemble cast and its new approach to the series’ canon. To an extent, it’s impossible imagining the series working as well as it does without Pedro Pascal in the titular role, as the portrayer of Din Djarin/The Mandalorian. But as Pascal revealed in a recent interview with Yahoo Movies UK, the process of him officially getting cast in the part occurred at an interesting point in pre-production, when the Disney+ series was already conducting camera tests.

“At the start of this thing, the most secret part of it was the first phone call. They said that Jon Favreau and [executive producer] Dave Filoni wanted to meet me to talk about “something Star Wars”. Those were the words,” Pascal explained. “So when I went to go and meet Jon, they brought me into a room where the walls were covered, corner to corner, with story illustrations of the whole first season. It was obviously this incredible Star Wars story with a Boba Fett-looking character at the centre of most of it and then, obviously, this adorable, small Baby Yoda.”

“All on the same day, they took me to the set where they were doing camera tests. They introduced me to Kathleen Kennedy, they put the helmet on my head and then Jon sent me off with six scripts to look at and to get an idea. I might be getting him in trouble. The studio may not know this,” Pascal continued. “This was all to get an idea, to help me consider the project and also, at least from my perspective, for them to consider whose voice they wanted to hear coming from inside that mask. They cast me in the part and as we got closer to launching the first season while shooting the second, it’s now a very practiced lockdown on all things to make sure that nothing gets out.”

Obviously, Pascal’s casting in the part absolutely paid off, as the series has been embraced quite a lot since its premiere last fall. With two more seasons of the series already in various stages, it’s safe to say they’ll

“Really, it just feels like being a part of a big family. We’re sort of the youngest child in this large family, discovering and carving a way out in the world. There’s so much for us to learn.”

Season 2 of The Mandalorian premieres exclusively on Disney+ this October.