Rachel Zegler, courtesy of Nathan Johnson
Rachel Zegler, who plays Maria in Steven Spielberg’s upcoming musical, “West Side Story”, joined the cast of “Shazam: Fury of the Gods” for DC and New Line, TheWrap learned exclusively.
Zegler will play a key role, keeping details secret. Zegler also becomes the second Colombian American to be cast in a DC superhero project, after Sasha Calle joins the cast of “The Flash” in the role of Supergirl.
“Shazam: Fury of the Gods” is a highly anticipated sequel to the 2019 film by New Line and DC Comics, “Shazam!” The story of teenager Billy Batson will continue, as he recites the magic word “Shazam!” he is struck by the Living Lightning of the gods and becomes his adult superhero alter ego, Shazam.
Read too: Watch the new ‘West Side Story’ star Rachel Zegler Belt Out ‘Shallow’ from ‘A Star Is Born’ (Video)
Zachary Levi will repeat his role as the child superhero who is gifted with the powers of six gods: the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the resistance of Atlas, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles and the speed of Mercury . While Shazam is a formidable champion, Billy Batson is still just a kid who likes to have fun trying to navigate high school while learning how to use those powers.
David F. Sandberg is returning to direct a script sequence for Henry Gayden and Chris Morgan. Peter Safran is producing through The Safran Company alongside Geoff Johns of Mad Ghost Productions. “Shazam” is based on the DC character created by Bill Parker and CC Beck.
“Shazam!” it was the world’s No. 1 movie on its opening weekend in 2019, winning more than $ 366 million worldwide with a relatively modest budget for a superhero movie. The film, starring Asher Angel as teenager Billy and Jack Dylan Grazer as his companion, won an ‘A’ CinemaScore with the audience and a 90% certified star rating from Rotten Tomatoes.
Read too: Zachary Levi to star in Live Action ‘Harold and the Purple Crayon’ at Sony
Rachel Zegler is a singer and songwriter, raised in New Jersey by her American father and Colombian mother. She was one of 30,000 people who auditioned to play Maria in Spielberg’s remake of the classic “West Side Story”, and stars alongside Ansel Elgort as Tony. She played the role for the first time in a presentation by the School of the Performing Arts at the Bergen Performing Arts Center. Zegler will star alongside Rita Moreno, who won an Oscar as Anita in the original film version of “West Side Story”, as well as Tony winner David Alvarez, Tony nominee Ariana DeBose and Josh Andres Rivera as Chino.
Zegler has an entire YouTube channel with covers of pop songs and Broadway standards, including his own interpretation of “Shallow”, the internet-breaking duet of Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper in “A Star Is Born”. In fact, one short video her singing the song in front of an empty auditorium went viral on Twitter with over 11.5 million views.
Zegler also shared videos of herself acting as Maria in a 2017 high school production of “West Side Story”, including her final monologue and a video titled “West Side Story in Five Minutes”.
Zegler is represented by ICM Partners.
“Shazam! Fury of the God ”will be released on June 2, 2023.
For the record: an earlier version of this story misspelled “West Side Story”.