In a new interview, the Netflix's series showrunner Matt Owens mentions talks about casting the 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' actress as Doctor Kureha for the upcoming sophomore season.
- October 5, 2023
AceShowbiz - Netflix's "One Piece" showrunner is offering fans some updates on season 2 of the live-adaption to Eiichiro Oda's best-selling manga of the same name. In a new interview, Matt Owens mentioned talks about casting Jamie Lee Curtis for the upcoming sophomore season.
"We have opportunities to stunt cast some roles, some rules that are very important, and it came out that Jamie Lee Curtis is a 'One Piece' fan," Matt told Deadline. The "Halloween Ends" actress previously showed interest in playing the role of Doctor Kureha.
Matt continued, "As soon as she said that, we were like, okay, we have to try and get her on the show. What can we do? And Doctor Kureha, very luckily, is a character who is coming up in our story, and is someone who is perfect for Jamie Lee Curtis. So we tried to start manifesting this dream of ours."
"After she won her Oscar, the writers room sent her a figure of Doctor Kureha with a nice note that said, 'Congratulations on your statue, here's another one to put next to it. Hope to speak to you soon.' When she reposted that, it got a lot of fan interest, and I commented on it. We're trying to manifest it," he added, though he noted that "as of right now, SAG is still striking so there have not been real conversations."
Despite that, Matt assured fans that "as soon as there can be, I'm ready. I will take her out to dinner, we'll talk about it. We'll do all of it because at this point we're writing for her - we really, really want her to come and play with us in season 2."
Jamie showed interest in playing Kureha in an Instagram post last month. After fans urged the show to cast Jamie as the character, who is the adoptive mother of Tony Tony Chopper, the actress wrote on her page, "ONCE the STRIKE against the greed of the AMTPT is SETTLED with a FAIR CONTRACT, I will lobby along with the growing fan frenzy to become Doctor Kureha in @onepiecenetflix."
The "Everything Everywhere All at Once" actress seemingly didn't have to put into so much effort to get the role. Matt responded at the time, "No need to lobby. Once we get what we deserve and get back to work, let's talk!"
