It was a casting choice that spawned hundreds of headlines when it was announced in October, sparking claims of Hollywood "whitewashing" history.
But Gal Gadot has defended her upcoming portrayal of Cleopatra in a new interview, revealing filmmakers had tried to find an actress who shared the Ancient Egyptian queen's Macedonian heritage.
When her casting was revealed, many fans claimed the role should have been given to a star from North Africa, though Gadot noted the Egypt-born royal was of Greek-Macedonian descent.
"If you want to be true to the facts then Cleopatra was Macedonian," the actress told the BBC this week.
"We were looking for a Macedonian actress that could fit Cleopatra. She wasn't there, and I was very passionate about Cleopatra."
The Israeli star, 35, will play the Queen of the Nile in a yet-to-be-titled Paramount Pictures film helmed by her Wonder Woman director, Patty Jenkins.
Gadot told the BBC she wanted to "celebrate the legacy of Cleopatra and honour this amazing historic icon that I admire so much".
"I have friends from across the globe, whether they're Muslims or Christian or Catholic or atheist or Buddhist, or Jewish of course... People are people," she said.
"But, you know, anybody can make this movie and anybody can go ahead and do it. I’m very passionate that I’m going to do my own, too.”
Cleopatra may have had some Persian ancestry but scholars almost unanimously agree that she did not have a drop of Egyptian blood in her.
The queen traced her family origins to Ptolemy I Soter, one of Alexander the Great's generals, who founded the Ptolemic Kingdom in Egypt in 305BC after Alexander the Great's conquest.
To date, no Egyptian actress has played the role of the country's last Ptolemaic ruler in a blockbuster film, though she was famously immortalised on the big screen by Elizabeth Taylor in 1963's Cleopatra.
Gadot, who will also produce the new Cleopatra film, said at the time of her casting that she hoped to tell the queen's "story for the first time through women's eyes, both behind and in front of the camera".
Wydad 2 Urawa 3
Wydad Nahiri 21’, Hajhouj 90'
Urawa Antonio 18’, 60’, Kashiwagi 26’
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
How much of your income do you need to save?
The more you save, the sooner you can retire. Tuan Phan, a board member of SimplyFI.com, says if you save just 5 per cent of your salary, you can expect to work for another 66 years before you are able to retire without too large a drop in income.
In other words, you will not save enough to retire comfortably. If you save 15 per cent, you can forward to another 43 working years. Up that to 40 per cent of your income, and your remaining working life drops to just 22 years. (see table)
Obviously, this is only a rough guide. How much you save will depend on variables, not least your salary and how much you already have in your pension pot. But it shows what you need to do to achieve financial independence.
The Africa Institute 101
Housed on the same site as the original Africa Hall, which first hosted an Arab-African Symposium in 1976, the newly renovated building will be home to a think tank and postgraduate studies hub (it will offer master’s and PhD programmes). The centre will focus on both the historical and contemporary links between Africa and the Gulf, and will serve as a meeting place for conferences, symposia, lectures, film screenings, plays, musical performances and more. In fact, today it is hosting a symposium – 5-plus-1: Rethinking Abstraction that will look at the six decades of Frank Bowling’s career, as well as those of his contemporaries that invested social, cultural and personal meaning into abstraction.
Top Hundred overseas picks
London Spirit: Kieron Pollard, Riley Meredith
Welsh Fire: Adam Zampa, David Miller, Naseem Shah
Manchester Originals: Andre Russell, Wanindu Hasaranga, Sean Abbott
Northern Superchargers: Dwayne Bravo, Wahab Riaz
Oval Invincibles: Sunil Narine, Rilee Rossouw
Trent Rockets: Colin Munro
Birmingham Phoenix: Matthew Wade, Kane Richardson
Southern Brave: Quinton de Kock
The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable
Amitav Ghosh, University of Chicago Press
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
World Series
Game 1: Red Sox 8, Dodgers 4
Game 2: Red Sox 4, Dodgers 2
Game 3: Saturday (UAE)
* if needed
Game 4: Sunday
Game 5: Monday
Game 6: Wednesday
Game 7: Thursday
FIXTURES (all times UAE)
Sunday
Brescia v Lazio (3.30pm)
SPAL v Verona (6pm)
Genoa v Sassuolo (9pm)
AS Roma v Torino (11.45pm)
Monday
Bologna v Fiorentina (3.30pm)
AC Milan v Sampdoria (6pm)
Juventus v Cagliari (6pm)
Atalanta v Parma (6pm)
Lecce v Udinese (9pm)
Napoli v Inter Milan (11.45pm)
