Raining Spaeny

This year I haven’t managed to get to many movies on the big screen but somehow Cailee Spaeny has been in most of them. First at the beginning of the year she played the young photojournalist alongside Kirsten Dunst in the controversially uncontroversial Civil War by Alex Garland. Then, with barely any fanfair she’s the Sigourney Weaver analogue in the brand new Alien: Romulus.

With supporting roles in films including “Pacific Rim Uprising” and “Bad Times at the El Royale,” she received a Golden Globe Award nomination for the title role in Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla,” before starring in “Civil War.”

That’s an incredible draft of films in such a short period of time. She bagged her first role in Pacific Rim Uprising at just 17, after getting her mum to drive her out to LA to get set up.

Director/writer/executive producer Fede Alvarez met Spaeny several years before work on “Alien: Romulus” had even begun, and the actress was always his number-one choice. “I do a fantasy casting when I’m writing a script, where I put photos up on a board of actors (and even people who are not actors) to connect with the characters better,” he says. “Cailee’s photo was the first up on the wall…I always knew she was Rain.”

“I’ve always been a fan of this franchise,” Spaeny says. “It is iconic. I was ecstatic when I heard Fede was directing the next ‘Alien’ movie. It was an amazing opportunity, with an exciting script and a badass character.”

So what’s next for her? The 26 year old doesn’t know. “This could really easily be a chapter of my life and not my whole life,” she told NYT. “There’s only so many tricks an actor has up their sleeve.”