Though Disney+’s Andor series — a prequel to the 2016 motion picture Rogue One: A Star Wars Story — has been pretty great about casting continuity, at least one legacy character is now sporting a brand-new face.
Midway through Episode 6 of Season 2 (now streaming on Disney+), Senator Mon Mothma (played by Genevieve O’Reilly) and her husband Perrin (Alastair Mackenzie) got gussied up to tour the art collection of shady Chandrilan financier Davo Sculdun aka their daughter Leida’s new father-in-law. En route to the VIP experience, they ran into Mon’s colleague, Senator Bail Organa.
Since the 2002 prequel trilogy entry Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones, Bail had been played by Jimmy Smits. The NYPD Blue and L.A. Law alum also played Leia’s father in the aforementioned Rogue One, Disney+’s 2022 Obi-Wan Kenobi series and some video game titles.
Benjamin Bratt in ‘Andor’
On Andor, however, the senator is being played (in multiple Season 2 episodes) by Benjamin Bratt, whose previous TV credits include Poker Face, Private Practice, Law & Order, 24: Live Another Day and… let’s go with with a deep cut, E-Ring.
Andor Season 2 filmed November 2022 through Spring 2023, with the Chandril scenes shot in Valencia, Spain. Smits during that stretch of time was largely busy shooting CBS’ East New York, 3,700 miles away in the Big Apple.
Jimmy Smits with Simone Kessell in ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’
“It’s very difficult sometimes to bring legacy characters back, for a whole variety of reasons,” Andor creator Tony Gilroy explained to TVLine. And in the case of Bail Organa and Smits, “they just couldn’t work it out” due to the franchise vet’s East New York commitments.
Star Wars vets among the Andor cast include O’Reilly (who has played Mon in a number of projects) and Rogue One‘s Diego Luna (as Cassian Andor), Forest Whitaker (Saw Gererra) and Ben Mendelsohn (Orson Krennic).
Is the Force strong with Andor‘s pick to step in as Senator Bail Organa? Chime in below, and grade Season 2’s second batch of three episodes.
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