Liam Neeson, who voiced Aslan in three “Narnia” films, learned only this week that Meryl Streep will take over the role in Greta Gerwig’s Netflix reboot, and he approves.
Neeson heard the news during a Screen Rant interview promoting his new film “The Mongoose.” The interviewer mentioned that “Narnia” was returning to the screen, and Neeson said he had not known. After being told Streep will voice the lion, he joked that she would be playing Jesus Christ, a reference to Aslan’s Christlike role in C.S. Lewis’s books. “Well, if you’re going to make Christ a lady, nobody better than Meryl,” he said.
Neeson gave Aslan his deep baritone in “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,” “Prince Caspian” and “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader,” released between 2005 and 2010. The series ended after the third film, and the books sat dormant on screen for years until Netflix and Gerwig took them on.
Gerwig is launching her franchise with “The Magician’s Nephew,” the book that comes first chronologically but was one of the last Lewis wrote. She confirmed Streep’s casting in September. The choice split fans, many of whom grew up with Neeson’s performance and some of whom debated the decision to cast a woman as a lion long portrayed as male. An early trailer in October presented the film as a colorful, large-scale introduction to the world of Narnia.
Neeson’s reaction, delivered in his usual deadpan style, adds a friendly note after weeks of online arguments. Streep, an Oscar winner many times over, has not commented on the comparison to her predecessor in the role. The film opens in theaters in February 2027 before streaming on Netflix, according to a Philippine release listing. Netflix has framed the project as a fresh start, not a continuation of the earlier movies, and Neeson’s surprise shows how little overlap there is between the two versions.
