When Catherine Laga’aia responded to an open casting call for the titular role in Disney’s remake of Moana, she didn’t expect to beat 32,000 applicants to the role. Her live-action interpretation of the beloved character voiced by Auli’i Cravalho in the original film and its 2024 sequel positions her for greater exploits in Hollywood. The Samoan-English actress from Australia fell in love with acting in her early years after witnessing her father’s enormous passion for the craft.
As one of eight children born to Star Wars’ Captain Typho actor Jay Laga’aia, the Moana actress grew up admiring her father’s commitment to acting. She attended Newtown High School of the Performing Arts and also trained at the National Institute of Dramatic Art, where she bagged a diploma of stage and screen performance. Catherine Laga’aia’s debut movie role has definitely set her up for a remarkable career. Where does she go from here?
How Catherine Laga’aia Landed The Iconic Role
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Before Moana, Catherine Laga’aia had only appeared in three episodes of The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, an Australian miniseries that ran on Amazon Prime Video in 2023. Nine months after her screen debut, she was cast to play the Polynesian Disney princess opposite Dwayne Johnson, John Tui, and Frankie Adams. Being a huge fan of the character, Laga’aia was unsure of her ability to play the live-action version when she responded to an open casting call for the role. But her parents encouraged her to seize the opportunity.
The actress has attributed landing the role to her mother’s confidence and her father’s big advice. She told The Hollywood Reporter that her mother, Sandie Jane Laga’aia, was sure she’d snag the part. If Sandie’s conviction stemmed from her daughter’s striking resemblance to the animated version of the character, Jay ensured that Laga’aia brought her A-game to the audition. “…Your job is the audition. Your job is not the job. You don’t have that yet,” Jay advised his daughter. “So your job is whatever side they gave you and whatever song they want you to sing.”
Going into the audition, Catherine Laga’aia recalled that the advice left her determined to ace it. It gave her “that mentality of coming in and being like, ‘I’m going to give this every ounce of effort that I’ve got, I’m going to give this every piece of myself to try and put the best foot forward,” she said. Cravalho and Thomas Kail, the director of the new Moana movie, have both confirmed that Laga’aia’s audition set her apart as the perfect cast for the role.
Catherine Laga’aia’s Preparation For The Role And Life On Set
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To prepare for the role, the young actress embraced Cravalho and Kail’s advice to own the role. Catherine Laga’aia disclosed that the duo dissuaded her from recreating what’s already been done. So she dug into her real-life experience as a teenager. “Coming into it, I wanted to bring elements of myself and pieces of who I am,” she said. “Leaving my school and leaving the thing I know to travel somewhere new that I’d never been before… seeped its way into my performance.”
Catherine Laga’aia reiterated that she prioritized being different in another interview with People. “Everyone’s advice was just that it’s going to be something different… Embracing that and stepping into that with as much ambition and imagination as you can was the best route for us,” she told the publication. Among other things, the actress was trained in dancing, sailing, and rowing to prepare for the physical demands of the role.
“I did a lot of underwater and swimming training, and I learned how to sail and row the traditional va’a canoes,” she told Backstage. “I spent three days in an actual canoe in Hawaii with the [Polynesian] Voyaging Society, out on the water learning to sail it. I learned a lot of different styles of dance too… Everything was thrown at me. It was stunting, sailing, dancing, all packed into one.”
What’s Next For The Moana Actress?
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Catherine Laga’aia’s lifelong dream revolves around theater. “That was the element of acting that I loved the most,” she told THR while acknowledging her newfound love for performing onscreen. “I’m excited by the idea of doing indies, similar things to Moana, but I would feel incomplete if I never got to do something onstage.” The actress intends to focus on building her skills with television and movie roles.
However, her “absolute dream would be to work on the West End, Broadway, the National Theater in London,” she disclosed to Backstage. Like Stranger Things actress Sadie Sink, she wants to perform in Kimberly Belflower’s John Proctor Is the Villain when it comes to Australia. Check out the actor behind Lord of the Flies’ antagonist, Lox Pratt.
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