Daisy's real identity, and the fact that she's a character that we knew from the comics, is one of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D's biggest twists. How early on did you know that you were going to be a superhero?
Honestly, I'm pretty sure the fans guessed it before I knew. I didn't know about it at all. I had inklings. I had a feeling that I was going to turn into something by the end of the season one, or maybe even at the beginning of season two. I'm not quite sure. It's all kind of a blur.
But I remember someone being like, "You're going to be a superhero." I was like, "What?" I was cast as a computer hacker who lives in a van like a complete dork, not physical stuff. I thought it was pretty funny. I was like, "No way. I'm not athletic. I can't do that." And then I looked at a bunch of fan theory websites. I remember thinking maybe I'd be Mantis, or She-Hulk, or some random thing.
And then, I remember this one time, it was 2:00 AM and I was reading some fan blog and someone was like, "I think that she's Daisy. I think she's Quake. I think she's Daisy Johnson." And then I googled the character and I saw a little bit. They definitely took their time when it came to telling me. I was probably the last to know, I think.
Like you said, it's a pretty physical role. What kind of training have you done?
Oh, so, I must have found out at the end of season one, because in between seasons one and two I heard that I was going to have to be doing more stunts, so voluntarily, pretty much through that entire hiatus, I trained as much as I could with this guy Matt, who was incredible. And he worked on our show at the same time, ultimately as a choreographer, throughout the series.
It was a lot of training. I really was starting from nothing. That month that I put myself through, it was kind of... It was not for the show, but I just knew I didn't want to show up and... They were going to put me through maybe a week or so, but I just knew, knowing my capabilities, that was not going to be long enough.
It was every day. It felt like, between season one and two, there wasn't much of a break. It was a lot of training on my end. And from then on, we are a smaller production compared to the movies. In the movies, the actors are getting months of training and rehearsals for one scene, for these stunt scenes, where we would get probably 45 minutes to rehearse.
And then, you just have to move so quickly. That training ultimately ended up being such a huge benefit to me to go back to as the series continued to get just more and more and more physical.
Is there a stunt or action sequence that you found particularly challenging or interesting?
It's funny, because I got into acting because I really hated doing sports. I grew up with so many brothers, six brothers, and then it turned out that I had to really be the one that treated my body like I was an athlete because I was doing so much physical stuff that I had to constantly make sure I was healthy and I was in the right shape.
I loved any car work that we did. Season four, when I was riding on top of Ghost Rider's car through the tunnels of L.A., that was so much fun — that was really me on there, on an umbilical rig. I just cruised. Or the scene where I'm falling out of the car, or falling out of the plane with Coulson.
I love that kind of wire work. Wire work is really difficult. There was also the zero-gravity scene. It was season five, where we're fighting with no gravity. I'm on a wire. That's a lot of it. It's very, very challenging, but also really fun. That's really well choreographed. And then, just to get to learn about all the incredible stuntwomen and stuntmen that are in the industry. The show, I think, is underrated, especially with so many action movies. They're the backbone of the industry, and it was such a privilege to get to work with so many of them over the past seven years.
