Sasha Banks Gives More Details on How She Landed Her Role on The Mandalorian

Sasha Banks made her debut on the hit Disney+ series Star Wars: The Mandalorian last week as the Mandalorian Koska Reeves. This marked Banks’ first major acting role outside of WWE and wrestling fans were thrilled to see her land a role on such a popular show. In a new interview with Variety this week, Banks went into more detail about how she wound up with the part and what it was like filming the episode.

“So Jon Favreau came to me because he watched an interview that I did with ‘Hot Ones.’ And he really liked me and got my contact information,” she said. “Then on FaceTime he asked me to be part of ‘The Mandalorian.’ I was like, ‘Well, I cannot say no,’ but I was so incredibly nervous, because I didn’t know if I was going to be able to do it with the WWE schedule. You know, we used to travel a lot. But they made it work and everything happened. And it was such an incredible episode. I still just can’t get over how awesome that was. Not only to be part of ‘Star Wars,’ but one of legit the greatest episodes in the history of television like that. I could watch that all the time. That was such a bad ass introduction to the world of ‘Star Wars.’ I’m so thankful I saved Baby Yoda! I cannot get over it. Oh my god”

“Just like the first time ever seeing a wrestling ring. It’s like the first time ever seeing anything just so magical,” Banks later added. “I would hate to ruin like how it looked backstage, but you felt like you were in a different galaxy in a different world. It was so almost easy to play a Mandalorian because I was legit in the universe. And you know, Jon Favreau and David Filoni and Bryce Howard, they were so amazing towards me. Any questions I had, because I was so incredibly shy and nervous., they answered. But [Jon] reminded me ‘Uh, you do WWE every single week and you do that live. You are amazing. There’s a reason why I wanted you to be a part of the show.’ So that made me feel like home and I totally gained a whole new family and I’m just so thankful.”

The episode saw Reeves, Axe Woves (Simon Kassianides) and Bo-Katan Kryze (Katee Sackhoff) recruit the titular Mandalorian in order to hijack an imperial ship. The mission was a success, though Mando opted not to follow the trio due to his mission to lead The Child (aka Baby Yoda) back to his homeworld. Since the episode ended with her still alive, there’s always a chance Banks could pop up in future episodes.