As soon as the Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer aired on December 5, fans went on a mission. Given that GTA 6 is already destined to be one of the biggest games of all time, everyone had a central question, who is playing one of its two leads, Lucia, who was featured prominently in the first trailer alongside her partner in crime, Jason?
That led to a few weeks of hunting and a few false starts, but fans have decided on a relatively unknown actress that has a mountain of evidence in her favor as the one who landed the dream role. That would be actress Manni L. Perez. Michael’s actor, Ned Luke, was found just eight days after the first GTA 5 trailer aired, so this is sort of tradition. And three weeks later, here’s why everyone thinks it’s Perez.
- First, the obvious, she looks like Lucia, and in this age of performance capture rather than pure voiceovers, that’s usually how it works:
- She talks about transitioning her career into voiceover and performance capture in two year old interview, when work on GTA 6 would already be in full swing.
- She did voicework for GTA 5 and GTA Online in an extremely minor role as a “clubber.”
- Rather than issuing a denial, Perez deleted all posts on her Instagram after fans began posting “Lucia!” everywhere.
It’s true, at least one more actress was pursued by the community as a possible fit, but Perez seems to be an extremely likely option. The downside is, all this attention is no doubt exhausting and if it is her, she still won’t be able to talk about it for potentially several more years, given when GTA 6 is likely to actually be released, unless Rockstar unveils a cast list sooner. Which seems unlikely or still very far off.
As for what this might do for Perez, that depends. Rockstar has a history of picking generally unknown actors for their lead roles that are extremely talented, but have not exactly rocketed to movie stardom after this. For instance, out of GTA 5’s Ned Luke (Michael), Shawn Darnell Fonteno (Franklin) and Steven Ogg (Trevor), only Ogg has done that much higher profile work as a character actor, appearing in projects like The Walking Dead and Better Call Saul. The same is true of GTA 4 and Red Dead 1 and 2’s lead actors. (One big exception, of course, is way back in 2002 when Ray Liotta voiced Tommy Vercetti for Vice City).
Perez, meanwhile, is in a unique position as the first woman leading a GTA series. While it could really elevate her career in a way that hasn’t happened for too many of the men, it also no doubt means a lot of ogling and potential harassment, unfortunately, as an attractive woman on the internet. That has already started.
It’s a voice/performance capture dream job, and if it is Perez, man, I really hope she negotiated a good deal to star in a game guaranteed to sell 100 million copies.
Follow me on Twitter, Threads, YouTube, and Instagram. Subscribe to my free weekly content round-up newsletter, God Rolls.
Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
Read the full article here
