Daisy Ridley to be honored at the 2024 Deauville Festival

The actor who played Rey Skywalker in the latest Star Wars trilogy will receive the New Hollywood Award.

Here we go again! After having dedicated last year Emilia Clarke – Daenerys in Game of Thronesbut also Qi'ra in Solo: A Star Wars Story – it is the turn of a second actress from this same galaxy very very far away to receive the New Hollywood Prize at the Deauville Festival. Since 2011, the latter has been awarded to emerging figures of the seventh art, to those who will make the cinema of tomorrow. The next on the list is therefore Daisy Ridley.

In 2015, the British actress's career took off at lightning speed when JJ Abrams chose her to play the new heroine of the future trilogy Star Wars. She then becomes, in the eyes of the general public, Rey, the young Jedi apprentice. Between two intergalactic voyages and lightsaber fights, she turns in Murder on the Orient Express by Kenneth Brannah and alongside Tom Holland in Chaos Walking.

But in parallel with these big-budget productions, Daisy Ridley turned to independent auteur cinema, giving new ranges to her acting. She thus plays a lonely woman suffering from social anxiety and paralyzed by her fears of death in The Dream Life of Miss Fran released earlier this year.

The Secret Life of Miss Fran: “Not all films have to show fireworks”

Most recently, viewers were able to see her in the role of Gertrude Ederle, the first woman to swim the English Channel in 1920, in the biopic Facing the Sea: The Story of Trudy Ederle available on Disney+. Soon, she will return in her flagship role for a Star Wars Episode Xthe first film in the saga directed by a woman, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, and taking place fifteen years after the events of the last part.

The news of her presence at the Deauville American Film Festival comes a few days after the actress revealed in the latest issue of Women's Health suffer from Graves' disease, an autoimmune disease characterized by hyperthyroidism – an overproduction of the thyroid hormone and which causes various health problems such as heart problems, nervousness, shortness of breath and weight loss:

“We often hear stories of women who are undiagnosed or underdiagnosed, and we need to be willing to say: 'I don't feel well', and not to repeat: 'I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine,' when I'm not. It's okay to not feel okay.”

For its fiftieth edition, the Deauville Festival will pay tribute to James Gray (Two Lovers, The Night Belongs to Us, Ad Astra) and will welcome Michael Douglas as guest of honor. In terms of competition, the jury chaired by Benoît Magimel will have to deliberate between fourteen films. This year, the Festival will be held from September 6 to 15.

The Deauville Festival unveils its jury and all the films in competition in 2024