Rooney Fought for the Role of Lisbeth in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The pr for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has been in full swing for months so this blog which I started a week ago has some catching up to do! I have to admit that besides not being initially familiar with Rooney Mara, I also didn't know that she went through a lengthy 2 month audition process to score the part. In my last post, I wrote that Fincher directed her in The Social Network and that it was then that he must have seen her inner strength. Well, maybe. Maybe he got a glimpse of it but clearly, the role is Lisbeth Salander is so monumental he would need more than what Rooney shows in The Social Network to feel comfortable about casting her. This is what she said about her final meeting with David Fincher on the agonizing process this past summer in Entertainment Weekly.

 “At that point I was just super frustrated. I was like, ‘You have to decide. Either you think I’m the girl or you don’t. There’s not much more I can do to prove it to you.’ I went in there sort of ready to fight. I was pissed. But David sat me down and gave me this long speech about the part. Then he handed me his iPad, and it had the press release on it. He said, ‘I’m prepared to send this out. You have half an hour to let me know if you want the part.’”

Clearly, just like Lisbeth, Rooney Mara was prepared to fight for the role. And congrats to David Fincher who took the time to get it right!