Lucy Lawless Wants To Revive ‘Xena’: ‘No One Really Dies!’
Lucy Lawless has been a busy actress in recent months, particularly between her role as Salem‘s Countess Marburg and the upcoming Ash vs Evil Dead, but that doesn’t mean Ms. Lawless isn’t ready for more. In fact, Lucy reminisces about her Xena: Warrior Princess days and, as she recently mentioned, Ms. Lawless longs to bring Xena back to television. Lucy finds a two-hour Xena movie of special interest.
“I’ve been pitching that, actually,” Lawless said. “The fans really do want that, and I’ve met some people who’ve crowdfunded some things, and I’m just like, ‘Why don’t we just do that?'”
There’s no doubt that Lawless would have fan support and Lucy is sure she could get most of the Xena main cast to sign on with little problems, but there’s one other issue keeping Xena from screeching that famous war cry once more. It seems there’s been conflict over who actually owns the rights to Xena and that small snag has kept Lawless from from going to crowdfunding sources to finance her Xena revival.
“It’s still about who owns the rights to Xena. But it would still be cool to do it again with Renée [O’Connor], me, Ted [Raimi], and Bruce. It’d be a fun little gig, but what that is I don’t really know.”
Speaking of snags, Lucy laughs at the other problem: Xena was beheaded at the end of the original series.
“So what? Technicality!” Lawless laughs. “No one really dies! Screw her head back on, it’s a bit wonky, and she’s got a really bad attitude since she’s been in a box for 20 years, so they’ve got to get Xena’s mojo back, and go and save the world somehow.”
As she thinks about revivals, Ms. Lawless comes full circle with her thoughts on the Evil Dead television adaptation and, though she is now married to Rob Tapert, who was an executive producer on The Evil Dead (1981), Lucy recalls walking out on the film the first time she watched it.
“When I was 17, I saw the first Evil Dead with my boyfriend, and I stomped out after five minutes, saying, ‘The people who made this are sick, misogynistic assholes and they should be in prison!’ And 12 years later, I was married to one of them,” Lawless said, smiling at the irony. “It’s the ultimate ‘never say never.'”
“I’ve known Bruce as long, and Sam [Raimi], so it’s kind of a family business. So, I was delighted that there was a part for me in it,” Ms. Lawless said of Ash vs Evil Dead.
The series premiere of Ash vs Evil Dead will air on October 31 on Starz.
[Featured image: Lucy Lawless courtesy of Jason Merritt/Getty Images]
