Ahead of Letitia Wright returning to her MCU role of Shuri in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the actress stars in the biographical drama The Silent Twins. In Wright’s latest role, she portrays June Gibbons, one of two British identical twins with a compelling, yet heartbreaking true story that had their story told through the Marjorie Wallace-written 1987 novel. When speaking to playing June, Wright contrasted the role with playing a Marvel hero.
When CinemaBlend recently spoke with Letitia Wright about her role in The Silent Twins, the actress shared why there’s a different pressure when it comes to playing a living person rather than a beloved comic book character. In her words:
They're both really challenging. I always try to tell the truth in every part that I play. Obviously, there's more of a responsibility [in The Silent Twins] because there's someone's life that you are portraying on screen. And I think it's important to be sensitive and do your utmost best to bring justice and bring their story to life in a way that's pleasing to them, you know, and that's never easy. But thankfully, I try to be as professional as I can be and just give my all every time I go on set and thankfully, this is now a part of the collective of work that I'm really proud of.
The Silent Twins tells the story of the Gibbons twins from an early age, who were the daughters of Caribbean immigrants who moved their family to Wales. As the movie illustrates, Jennifer and June made a pact with one another at an early age to only communicate only with each other and remain silent to the rest of the world. As a result, they deal with various struggles, which later leads them to be sentenced to a psychiatric hospital for numerous years.
Wright shared with the NY Post that the twins' silence was a “protest” of the “systemic racism they experienced as children” being the only Black children in their community. June Gibbons is still living, thus creating an added responsibility for Letitia Wright to tell her story in a way sensitive to her life and the struggles June and Jennifer went through in their lives.
Wright must have accomplished her hopes for the role considering the movie beautifully directed by Polish filmmaker Agnieszka Smoczynska was given a “stamp of approval” by June Gibbons, per her interview with Essence. And rather than the 2022 book-to-movie adaptation telling the story of The Silent Twins simply, it includes the twins’ artistic expression, works through puppetry, writings and music, as both were each gifted creatives within their lives of self isolation.
As The Silent Twins hits theaters this weekend, there are just two months left until Letitia Wright returns to the MCU as Shuri in the upcoming Marvel movie Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. The movie follows the 2020 death of Chadwick Boseman, with the people of Wakanda seemingly figuring out how to move forward as T’Challa dies with him.
Letitia Wright has shared that she and the cast have “poured everything” in Wakanda Forever, and following the trailer drop during this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, we’re certainly excited to see how the storyline continues. Overall, it’s great to see 28-year-old Letitia Wright continue to challenge herself with new roles following previous roles in Black Mirror, Death On The Nile and Small Axe. The Silent Twins is playing in theaters now.
