John Boyega Had Just $17 Left When He Found Out He Was Cast in Star Wars

John Boyega didn’t get the call from Hollywood after years of building up credits. He got it when he had barely enough money to eat — and had to spend most of it just to show up.

Speaking at the Chicago Comic & Entertainment Expo, Boyega revealed that when J.J. Abrams called him in for what turned out to be the Star Wars casting confirmation, he had roughly $60 in his account. By the time he spent £33.83 (about $43) on transportation to meet Abrams, he was left with just £11 — about $17. “Do the math,” Boyega said. “I had nothing.”

He didn’t walk into that meeting confident. He walked in knowing Abrams might feed him, even if he didn’t get the part. “Each step I took, I was nervous,” Boyega admitted. “I sat down and I was like, ‘J.J., I’ll audition again. I can do British, Scottish, Nigerian.’ I was ready to beg.” Instead, Abrams simply looked at him and said, “You’re in Star Wars.”

Time stopped. Boyega remembers the sugar cubes on the table. The exact kind of silence that happens when your whole life pivots. And then Lawrence Kasdan, the film’s co-writer, walked in, looked at him, and said, “Kid, this movie’s gonna change your life.”

It did. The Force Awakens made over $2 billion. Boyega became a global name. But the story didn’t stay magical. Over the course of the trilogy, Boyega and other non-white cast members were pushed to the background. In 2020, he called it out directly. “Don’t bring out a Black character, market them like they’re the lead, and then sideline them,” he told GQ. “You knew what to do with Daisy. You knew what to do with Adam. But with me? Kelly Marie Tran? You did fuck all.”

Boyega said the Star Wars universe always had an elite, overwhelmingly white energy — the kind where simply existing as a Black man felt like a statement. “They’re okay with us being the sidekick,” he said. “But the hero? That’s when it’s ‘too much.’ That’s when it’s ‘pandering.’”

Still, he calls the moment he was cast “fundamental.” Because for better or worse, Star Wars changed everything. Even if it nearly broke him along the way.