Since getting cast as Noni Jean in Beyond the Lights, Gugu Mbatha-Raw has gone on to appear in Belle, Beauty and the Beast, and The Morning Show, among several others, but she was almost denied the breakthrough role. During a July 2015 interview with VODzilla.co, Beyond the Lights writer and director Gina Prince-Bythewood explained that — because Mbatha-Raw isn't a trained singer and was an unknown actress at the time — Prince-Bythewood had to fight to get her the part.
"The issue was that she wasn't a star," Prince-Bythewood said of Mbatha-Raw. "She was unknown and the studio that I was at said I couldn't cast her. But as a director, your talent is in your choices, and I knew in my gut that Gugu was right for the part, so we parted ways, the studio and I, and I started going to other studios, trying to get it set up again with Gugu in the lead. We kept getting turned down, really for that reason, just that she wasn't a star and they didn't want to bank millions of dollars on someone that was unproven. But, finally Relativity, which is a smaller studio, and BET as well, stepped up, recognised her talent, and paid for the film."