Though it had been expected to go into active production in September this year, it appears that FX and Noah Hawley’s Alien series has actually gone in front of the cameras this week! According to a new report from Deadline, production started on the 19th of July, and they also have details of 4 members of the previously unannounced cast of Hawley’s series.
Deadline can reveal that Alex Lawther, known for his starring role in Netflix’s young adult drama The End of the F*cking World, has been cast as the male lead, a soldier named CJ, with Samuel Blenkin (Black Mirror) as another main character, Boy Kavalier, a CEO. Additional cast members include Essie Davis (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries) as Dame Silvia and Adarsh Gourav (The White Tiger) as Slightly.
28 years old Alex Lawther appears to be playing the character previously known as Hermit, a Medic assigned to to Prodigy Tactical Response, the private military of Prodigy Corporation. While best known for his role in The End of the F*cking World, Lawther also appeared recently in Disney’s Star Wars series, Andor and as King Charles in the Sir Ridley Scott’s The Last Duel.
Alex Lawther (Left) and Samuel Blenkin (Right)
Samuel Blenkin will portray Boy Cavalier, the CEO of the Prodigy Corporation, who has been previously described as “a very young man who is the CEO of a company called The Prodigy Corporation. This company is at the heart of the series, with their experiments and creations leading a new wave into metahuman territory.” Blenkin has appeared in Black Mirror, The Witcher: Blood Origin and The Sandman, as well as portraying Scorpius Malfoy in the stage production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.
The character of Dame Sylvia will be portrayed by Essie Davis, who previously starred as a lead in the wildly popular The Babadook. She also appeared recently in Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities. Little has been revealed about Dame Sylvia’s character, only that she is a human scientist responsible for mentoring Sydney Chandler’s Wendy on how to adjust to her synthetic body.
Nothing is known about Slightly, the character who will be played by Adarsh Gourav, the actor known for his role in The White Tiger and most recently Extrapolations.
Deadline also notes that the negotiations were completed long before the on-going strike currently taking place, and that the shooting schedules have been adjusted around the absence of SAG cast members – including Sydney Chandler – who are not present on set.
The deals for the actors were made well before the SAG-AFTRA strike started August 14, and those who are members of the American union are not currently in Thailand working on Alien, which is an Equity production, sources tell Deadline.
Production began Wednesday, July 19, at The Studio Park with crew filming scenes that don’t include SAG-affiliated actors.
Reps for American Chandler, who is best known for her role in Don’t Worry, Darling, confirmed she was “not in production.” Equity-affiliated English actor Lawther is in Thailand, filming, sources tell Deadline.
Prior to this announcement the only cast member we knew about was Sydney Chandler, who had been cast as the series’ female lead (presumably as Wendy, CJ’s sister). Thanks to Nightmare Asylum for the news!
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Threaten to sue them if they walk off set and then say it's okay if they don't pitch for work
The article as it is in my original post is how it read last night; it looks like they must have edited it since then...
I'm not seeing this bit (in bold) in the Deadline article?
I still need to get around to watching Andor. I'm sure I'd love it, I've just been pretty burnt on the total onslaught of Star Wars as of late.
The only thing I guess I've seen Samuel Blenkin in is The French Dispatch (but he's credited in that as just Cadet #4 and I honestly have no specific recollection of him, so I guess it was just a background part) so I don't have anything to really base him off of other than the provided headshot, but I do like the idea of a smarmy tech bro type running Prodigy (which will likely be a smaller corporation than Weyland Industries/Weyland-Yutani, I'm assuming), as a sort of contrast the very different type of asshole executive that is Peter Weyland.
And the CEO of the company being an extreme version of our era's tech bros is perfect. Remember that sci-fi is always about the times it is conceived in.
Ha, somehow totally missed this connection.
So him and Sydney Chandler are playing siblings (though I think we're still a bit hazy as to whether Chandler's body actually looks like the body that Wendy was born in, right?).
Aye, she is wonderful in that. She's also great in Jennifer Kent's "The Murmuring" from Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities. Very exciting bit of casting for this.
Cyborg ninja sword fights: check.
Anything resembling an Alien film: pending.
there's a non-zero chance of ninjas with this show.
But also
He's "Boy Kavalier" so.. our Peter Pan? Searching for Immortality?
And he brings "Wendy" into "Neverland" (a secret research site?)
I'm so disappointed they stuck with that name. But from what I know of the role, Blenkin looks fantastic for the part. Eager to see how he does in the role!
I loved Lawther in End of the f**king World. It's hard to imagine him as the lead in this though, I know he's 28 but he looks really young still. But you know me, open mind and all that!