MC: What was the audition and casting process for Black Canary like?
JSB: It was a role my manager actually had first mentioned to me. Initially, they weren't so interested in me even auditioning because I wasn't available—I was shooting Lovecraft Country for HBO, which was a direct conflict [Smollett-Bell's upcoming HBO horror drama, created by Jordan Peele and Misha Green]. Then, Misha said to me 'Aren't they casting for Birds of Prey?' I talked to her about it. I was, 'Yeah. It really sucks. They won't even let me audition for it because I'm not going to be available.' She said, 'Bitch, go after it!'
I went to my manager and my agents and said, 'Listen, Misha said I should go for it and that there's a chance they actually won't be shooting during that time.' I did a self-tape in Chicago while I was shooting the pilot for Lovecraft Country; they weren't telling us what the character was, but we had assumed it was Black Canary. I knew her from Injustice 2, the video game, which I played once in a while with my husband. Honestly, when I did the audition, I just thought All right. I'm going to do this, but they're never going to cast me. Then, I sent the tape in and they responded to it very enthusiastically and asked if I could come to L.A. to meet with the director, Cathy Yan. That went well. They asked for me to do a chemistry read with Margot [Robbie]. That went well. Then, they asked for me to screen test at Warner Bros., which was a grueling day. They were mixing and matching all of us girls into different pairings to see what the best chemistry was. I think I ended up doing this one scene over 30 times because there were so many different pairings. Black Canary was just so second nature to me. I just inherently understood her.