Brie Larson originally TURNED DOWN the role of Captain Marvel

Brie Larson revealed she turned down the role of Captain Marvel at first, because she didn’t think she could ‘handle that’ kind of pressure.

The actress, 30, spoke candidly about the audition process for the Marvel’s first female-led film during a video on her YouTube channel, which she shared with fans on Thursday.

Detailing how she was working on Kong: Skull Island in Australia at the time, she said: ‘I remember them calling and saying my role and if I was interested in playing Captain Marvel? I said “Oh I can’t do that, I have too much anxiety, that’s too much for me, I don’t think I can handle that so tell them no.”

‘And my team were like “okay sure”, and then a couple of months later they told me “hey they called again are you sure?” and I was like “yea I’m too much of an introvert, that’s way too big of a thing for me, it was beyond my comprehension and no”. 

‘Then they called a third time to ask if I was sure, so the point is every time I was saying no, and I thought my team were telling them no, they were not because I think they were thinking she would be great at this.’

Brie went on to explain that she has trouble working on more than one project at a time as she ‘can’t think of anything else’, which meant her agents felt the need to wait until she was done filming Kong to ask her about Captain Marvel again.

‘Time skips ahead and I’m back from filming, I had a meeting with [Marvel] and they had a pitch and they had a mock-up of the costume and I was very moved by what they were trying to achieve, what they were talking about, and it felt very progressive. 

‘I was very surprised by that, by the way that they were talking about feminism, the way they were handling it. 

‘They were like all female writers, female director, gonna have as many female voices in this as possible.’

She went on: ‘Part of what was amazing about it and scary about it was that I wasn’t allowed to talk to anybody about it.

‘Looking back on it I don’t think the Marvel police was going to come to my home if I told my mum, but I’m such a goody goody I couldn’t tell anyone about it.

‘So I thought about it and the next step was I said I really want to meet with the writers, let me talk to them and see if the story makes sense. 

‘To me I don’t need to be that, that’s a whole level of fame that I never expected to participate in and I thought okay the only way this works is if I believe in the story and the message it has and if that’s the case then okay, this is here and it’s happening, so it would be against the flow if I said no.’

Brie described her meeting with the writers as ‘amazing’ as she ‘loved everything they had to say’ and believed in the story they were trying to tell.

‘I remember going home thinking oh my god, I’m going to do this,’ she added. ‘I remember exactly where I was, I was in my dining room and I was staring at my really crappy bookshelf that I got from Salvation Army, still a broke actor, and I thought oh my god, I’m going to do this.

‘Then I agreed, and I remember laughing a lot, I remember my team being really proud of me because they knew it was a big step for me in embodying myself, believing I could do something so big, in my confidence as a leader, in the belief in storytelling.’

Detailing the aftermath of accepting the role, she went on: ‘After that I didn’t tell anybody, I had friends texting me saying you’re going to be Captain Marvel that’s amazing and I said I don’t know what you’re talking about. 

‘I was so scared, it felt really good when I was on the stage at Comic Con and it was open, of course I had to hold many secrets after that about what it was about and all that, but at least I was placed as Captain Marvel.’

Brie is set to return to her superhero role in an as-yet-untitled Captain Marvel sequel, which will be released in 2022.