‘Old Guard’ star KiKi Layne talks being a black action heroine

Actress KiKi Layne sat down for an interview with Variety where she opened up about working on the film The Old Guard and its new sequel.

About training for the second film, she remarked, “When it was greenlit, I had met my man and we were eating good so I had to make some adjustments to get ready for number two. Pushing yourself physically in a way that is a bit out of your norm, I really enjoy that as an aspect of character building. Nile is a very physical character. She’s a Marine. I see all of the training as an opportunity to honor who Nile is, while, at the same time, it’s a really nice feeling when your body’s changing and you’re feeling stronger. I’m like, “Oh, I might be able to knock somebody out now.”

On whether she does her stunts herself or asks for a stunt double, she explained, “I see stunts and fight choreography as an extension of the character and as an extension of the storytelling, so I want to be a part of that as much as possible. But honestly, the stunt where I jumped from the balcony to the flag. We had rehearsed that numerous times, and I had done it numerous times, and there was a day that we were rehearsing it and I was scared. It’s like something in my brain was just like, “No, we’ve already let you do this five times. You cannot do it again,” and I just couldn’t make the jump.”

Layne added, “So on the day we were filming it, I go upstairs to set, and my double is ready to do it, and I’m like, ‘What’s happening here?’ They’re like, ‘Oh, we’re about to do the jump.’ I said, ‘I’m doing the jump.’ And then I did it. I jumped from a balcony to a flag and swung through a window. It was amazing.”

Reflecting on the part she plays as a black actress, she remarked, “I hope to be the representation for little Black girls that I wish that I had more of growing up. Anytime that people come up to me and say that they felt seen by me playing the type of roles that I’ve been blessed to play, that means everything to me. That’s the reason to keep going because this business, it gets hard. It’s a really tough time in the industry right now. Work is scarce.”

She continued, “There’s a lot of ups and downs regardless of what level of success you’ve reached. As they say, new levels, new devils. And so in moments where I’m feeling a bit low and unsure, thinking about who I am trying to represent, who I am trying to encourage and uplift, sometimes that can give me more of a push to keep going than just thinking about myself. I have to be reminded all of this is so much bigger than me.”

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