You could say that Brianna Hildebrand has an explosive star quality. After all, she shot to fame this year in Deadpool – the highest grossing X-Men movie to date – as Negasonic Teenage Warhead, a trainee mutant with power to generate telekinetic blasts.
During a visit to Dubai last weekend, where she met fans at pop-culture festival PopCon, the 20-year-old Texan actress proved she has a few abilities of her own when she shared a photo on social media of herself doing a handstand in her hotel room. The tricky gymnastic manoeuvre was part of the Ashtanga yoga training she has been practicing.
“I put my phone on the longest timer and just ran and tried to do the longest handstand I possibly could – probably about four seconds,” she says. “I’m planning on getting better. The yoga pose helps me to calm down and focus when I need to.”
But Hildebrand was involved in more hardcore activities – "Muay Thai, and a lot of heavy lifting," she says – two years ago while filming Deadpool alongside Ryan Reynolds.
“I was weightlifting so I could build up my muscles, although having big muscles was a terrible idea for leather scenes,” says Hildebrand, whose character wears a suit that was “all goth-like and leathery”.
Unlike most friendly and keen superheroes, Negasonic is more of a sulky teenager, while Reynolds's Deadpool has a dark and twisted sense of humour. The characters' very human attributes are the reason why Hildebrand thinks the movie struck such a chord with so many people, as it became the highest-grossing R-rated film in history, giving Fox its biggest hit of 2016.
“A lot of superheroes today are a little self-righteous, and what’s cool about Deadpool is that he seems like a guy that you could meet at the 7-Eleven down the street,” she says. “I think that just makes it more relatable.”
Hildebrand says she knew the film would be special from the moment she read the script, but admits that she also knew it was a risky movie to make, given its unusual tone and adult humour – especially when US$7 million was slashed from the budget just before filming began.
“I think all of us had our doubts,” she says. “The studio was doubting us a little bit, so it was hard to stay positive while we were filming it, when all the budget cuts came in. But when I get a script in and I feel like I would definitely watch this in a theatre, that’s when I get super excited about a film.”
As a complete newcomer to the movie industry, Hildebrand was relieved that her co-stars and the crew were so welcoming when she arrived on set in Vancouver.
“They were really cool with me, and for some reason I hadn’t been expecting that,” she says.
Hildebrand became particularly close with former Muay Thai and Mixed martial arts champion Gina Carano, who played the super-strong villain Angel Dust.
“She was really awesome,” says Hildebrand. “There was a scene in the original movie that’s been cut out, but its on the deleted footage on the DVD, where Angel Dust and Sonic have this fist fight – that was the most super-fun scene to shoot. I loved being able to pretend that I could hurt her, because she’s so strong and obviously I’m not as strong as she is.”
Hildebrand admits that she had a crush on her co-star Ryan Reynolds when she was younger, and so was understandably nervous when they met.
“When I was in high school, I Photoshopped myself into a picture with him, which I really wanted him to see,” she says. “So I printed out 25 copies of the photo and I gave it to literally everyone. He wasn’t as thrilled about that as I was – but it was one of those cool circle moments in my lifetime. His name was on my childhood bedroom wall and then, he was just there in front of me.”
Now she’s acted with her teenage heart-throb, the next star Hildebrand would love to work with is Meryl Streep.
“I love her so much,” she says. “It just seems like if you’re in her presence she just calms you down. I haven’t talked to her yet – she was at an event I was at a couple of years ago and I was so excited to see her that I was too nervous to approach her. But next time, hopefully.”
Just as Deadpool put a fresh twist on the Superhero genre, Hildebrand's next movie, Tragedy Girls, which is in post-production, is a twist on the slasher-movie genre, featuring two death-obsessed teenagers who present an online show about real-life tragedies.
"It's really strange but it's got a great cast and it's hilarious," she says. "I got to work alongside Alexandra Shipp, who plays Storm in X-Men: Apocalypse, so that was really cool for me."
Another of Hildebrand's movies, First Girl I Loved, has just been released on iTunes and was her favourite movie so far. "mostly because it has a lot of personal meaning to me, but also because it was a smaller-budget film so we all got to hang out. We weren't just alone in our trailers".
Hildebrand has also had her first taste of voice acting, after recording the voice of She-Ra in a pilot for a new version of the old TV cartoon favourite.
She-Ra is the twin sister of the macho He-Man, from the Masters of the Universe series, who had her own spin-off cartoon between 1985 and 1987 – nine years before Hildebrand was born.
The actress feels the time is right for a revival of warrior princess, as young girls today need strong female figures to look up to.
“I think the only boy in the series so far, his name is Paul, and the rest of them are princesses – but they just completely save themselves, so that’s a great example for young girls,” she says.
Hildebrand is also hoping to return as Negasonic in the already announced Deadpool 2.
“I haven’t received the script so I’m not entirely sure if Negasonic is in it,” she says. “But if she’s not, I’ll be really mad about it. I think I’ll find out soon.”
Tim Miller, the director of the first film, dropped out of the sequel recently, reportedly due to creative differences with star Ryan Reynolds.
"I'm kind of sad that Tim is not going to direct any more of the Deadpool films, because I really love him, he's hilarious," says Hildebrand.
During her first trip to the UAE, Hildebrand stayed at the world’s tallest hotel, the JW Marriott Marquis Dubai, from where she tweeted: “FYI the longest, most awkward lift rides occur in the world’s tallest hotel.”