Jillian Morgese had just a few seconds of screen time in the Marvel epic. Here’s the tale of the improbable path she traveled to star in Whedon’s Much Ado About Nothing .
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Joss Whedon had one question for the young, anonymous background actress: "Can you be scared?"
Yes, she said, she could definitely do that.
"But can you break down and cry?"
Yep, no problem, she replied.
"OK," the director said, "now I just need you to look back at the destruction and give up on your life."
Jillian Morgese, it turned out, was so good at dying inside that it launched her into a brand-new career.
Jillian Morgese in The Avengers.
By her senior year at the Fashion Institute of Technology, the Fairlawn, New Jersey, native had decided that acting, not a job in fashion, was her true calling; Having taken drama classes throughout college, she began seeking out work in commercials and as an extra in TV shows that were filming in New York. A doe-eyed brunette with obvious talent, she began racking up background appearances in shows like Law & Order and Blue Bloods and featured parts in several commercials, even speaking Hindi while lying in a sunny meadow for a Nutrilite spot destined for India.
"The Hindi one is kind of one that makes everyone laugh that knows me," she giggled in a phone conversation with BuzzFeed this week, "because I did not know going into it that I would have to speak in a different language. So I learned it while I was on set, so that was really fun."
Morgese found herself on the set of The Avengers in the summer of 2011, dressed as a waitress in a café alongside actress Ashley Johnson. They were filming a short scene between Johnson and Captain America that would have established Johnson as a potential love interest had it not been cut in the editing process. But Morgese's part, which consisted of looking on in terror as destruction rains down in every direction, and then running from an explosion that blasts through the cafe's windows, remained in the final cut of the movie. In the United States alone, over 76 million people saw her trembling and then running like hell on the big screen.
During the downtime on set, Morgese and Whedon had a few friendly conversations, and clearly, she made an impression; a week and a half after her two days on the Avengers were over, the writer/director called and asked if she wanted to audition for a part in a little micro-budget adaptation he was planning of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing.
Like he even had to ask.
Whedon had her choose a Shakespearean monologue and connect on Skype a few days later. She performed the "Shall I Speak Ill of Him?" monologue from Romeo and Juliet, "And when I finished, he said, 'I want you to play the part of Hero. We're filming it at my house in about under two weeks, I'll send you the script. Are you available then?'"
Once again, the answer was obvious.
The next two weeks were spent intently learning the lines of the naive young woman who falls in love with Claudio — played by Fran Kranz, a veteran of Whedon projects such as Dollhouse and Cabin in the Woods.
"I read it before bed every night, I slept with it next to my pillow hoping it would just go into my head while I was sleeping," she said. "And then I'd be out to dinner with my friends and they'd be talking to me, and I'd be kind of listening and they'd say, 'Are you even listening to what we're saying?' And I'd be like, 'I'm going to be completely honest with you, I'm trying, but all that's in my head right now are Shakespeare lines.'"
