Castium Revelio: Make a Pit Stop for Casting News!
by Brienne Green, Mary Wojcicki · January 30, 2021
Welcome back to another week of MuggleNet’s Casting News, your source for the latest information on what our magical alumni have been up to! Are you ready to find out what’s new? Of course you are! Castium Revelio!
Bonham Carter also portrayed Princess Margaret in the latest season of The Crown on Netflix. A video from behind the scenes of the series shows Bonham Carter and costars dancing in costume to Lizzo’s song “Good as Hell.” The video surfaced during an interview between Gillian Anderson and Seth Meyers on Late Night with Seth Meyers earlier this week.
David Bradley (Argus Filch) stars in the upcoming film Roy, writes StokeonTrentLive. Oscar winner Rachel Shenton, who is from Stoke-on-Trent, will star in the film alongside him. Unfortunately, the website notes, “There is little information about the movie online, but has been written and directed by actor Tom Berkeley, who played Calvin in Doctors, and Ross White.”
We do know, however, that Shenton will be playing the role of Cara in the film. Hopefully, more information will be available on this project soon!
Focus Features has purchased the distribution rights for Sir Kenneth Branagh's (Gilderoy Lockhart) upcoming semi-autobiographical film, Belfast, reports IrishCentral. The cast of the film reportedly includes Caitriona Balfe, Jamie Dornan, Dame Judi Dench, and Ciarán Hinds. Ciarán Hinds is also a Harry Potter alumnus, having portrayed Aberforth Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2.
Branagh was quoted on the acquisition.
Belfast is my most personal film. It’s about coming home, a dramatic journey of excitement, emotion, and humor. To be embraced by filmmakers and distributors of such proven imagination and talent as Focus is fantastic. With the incredible support of Northern Ireland Screen also in the mix, we are very excited for the future of Belfast in cinemas around the world in 2021.
Branagh and Dame Maggie Smith (Minerva McGonagall) both have been named to The Stage 100 list, according to LondonTheatre.co.uk. The Stage is a British publication focused on the entertainment industry, particularly theater.
For the past 24 years, The Stage has listed the top 100 in order of influence. For 2021, the list has been split into different categories, with names listed in alphabetical order rather than power. There’s also just 99 entrants; the 100th space is a tribute to all other theatremakers who continue to persevere in theatre and the arts.
Branagh and Smith were honored in the Fundraising category for their involvement in the #ForTheLoveOfArts campaign.
Ralph Fiennes (Lord Voldemort) has two upcoming projects of note. The first is The King’s Man, the prequel to the existing Kingsman films, and it has a new release date! Devdiscourse reports that, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the film is now set to be released on March 12, 2021. Rhys Ifans (Xenophilius Lovegood) also stars in the film as the historical figure Grigori Rasputin.
Fiennes’s second project of note is The Dig, released yesterday (January 29) on Netflix. The East Anglian Daily Times writes about how Fiennes worked with local resident Charlie Haylock, who became his accent coach for the film on the Suffolk dialect that his character needed to speak.
Despite Haylock’s initial concerns that Fiennes would sound more like a pirate, he was ultimately pleased with the actor’s hard work.
Ralph was a very good student and wanted to get it right. Basil Brown was a self-educated man and had lea[r]nt Latin, Greek and other languages and had acquired a more refined Suffolk dialect and not so broad as the other characters portrayed in the film.
Stephen Fry, the narrator of the British Harry Potter audiobooks, has been keeping busy: He has multiple projects in the works, including some charitable efforts. In recent weeks, he has thrown his support behind efforts to save a local pub in a village in West Norfolk, and he has helped thank hospital staff in Oxfordshire. Fry also stars in the new five-part television drama series It’s a Sin, focusing on the early days of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s.
You can watch a trailer for the series below. Note that the content may not be appropriate for all viewers.
Radio Times has provided more information about the series, which premiered on January 22 on the United Kingdom’s Channel 4.
The drama focusses on a group of 18-year-olds who move to London in 1981 and rent a flat together (dubbed the ‘Pink Palace’). As the AIDS crisis looms, they each have differing attitudes to the then-rumoured virus, drawing stark parallels with the start of the current coronavirus pandemic.
The series was coproduced with HBO Max, and the Australian website Q News reports that It’s a Sin will be available for streaming via Stan in Australia.
David Heyman, producer of all of the Harry Potter films and all of the Fantastic Beasts films to date, will be producing the television adaptation of Ashley Audrain’s debut novel, The Push, after what Deadline describes as a “nine-way bidding war.”
Heyday Television secured the rights to the adaptation ahead of the book’s publication earlier this month, though Heyman was already quoted as speaking highly of the book.
I cannot recall the last time I read a novel as haunting as 'The Push.' It is challenging, moving and thought provoking in all the best ways.
CBC describes the book’s plot.
'The Push,' which is set to be published Jan. 5, 2021 by Penguin Random House, is a psychological drama about a woman named Blythe, who is experiencing motherhood for the first time, but it's not like she expected. When her first child, Violet, is born, she feels no connection to the baby — and Violet isn't anything like other babies. But Blythe's husband is convinced it's all in her head, and tells her everything will be fine if she just relaxes.
Audrain will serve as an executive producer on the adaptation.
Jessica Hynes, who voiced Mafalda Hopkirk in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, has joined an audio trail of short stories in Folkestone, Kent. KentOnline notes that the stories can be accessed in Lower Leas Coastal Park. Called StoryMap, the project was created by Hand of Doom Productions. The company had sourced stories through a competition held last year. (Hynes reportedly lives in Folkestone.)
More information about the Folkestone StoryMap can be found on its official website.
Ralph Ineson (Amycus Carrow) stars in The Watch, a television series based on Terry Pratchett’s Discworld that began airing on BBC America late last year. According to Meaww, Ineson portrays Detritus. Meaww adds, “The show will follow an unlikely group of misfits, The City Watch, who are forced to find the guts to save the world, surprising even themselves in the process.”
Jason Isaacs (Lucius Malfoy) will be joining the third season of the Netflix series Sex Education, according to InterviewerPR. Isaacs will reportedly play Peter Groff, whom Netflix describes in a tweet as the “more successful/less modest older brother” of Mr. Groff, played by Alistair Petrie.
You can catch Gary Oldman (Sirius Black) in a trailer for his upcoming film Crisis. The Film Stage dropped the trailer for Crisis earlier this week, ahead of the film’s release on February 26.
The film follows a number of storylines, as the synopsis notes: A drug trafficker arranges a multi-cartel Fentanyl smuggling operation. An architect recovering from an Oxycodone addiction tracks down the truth behind her son’s disappearance. A university professor battles unexpected revelations about his employer, a pharmaceutical company bringing a new 'non-addictive' painkiller to market. Set against the backdrop of the opioid epidemic, their stories collide.
Due to the film’s rating and content, we won’t be embedding its trailer here, but you can watch it on YouTube.
The COVID-19 pandemic didn’t stop Chris Rankin (Percy Weasley) from taking part in a pantomime production of Cinderella from Panto Live as the Fairy Godfather, as reported by Variety. Rankin also took part in an interview in which he explained the British Christmas tradition for Americans who might not be as familiar with it.
Pantomime is a family musical, traditionally, shown in theaters at Christmas. You all go to the pantomime from granny and granddad through to dad, who would much usually much rather be at home watching the football, and is sat there with his arms crossed on the front row.
The Panto Live production had to get creative. Since regular theatrical productions haven’t been able to go on as planned because of the pandemic, the production of Cinderella marks the world’s first interactive live pantomime. The production is now available to watch on demand, and viewers can find out more about it on its website.
Timothy Spall (Peter Pettigrew) has joined the cast of Spencer, an upcoming biopic about Princess Diana. Kristen Stewart (Twilight) will star as the late Princess of Wales, while Deadline reports that filming has begun in Germany and will then move to the United Kingdom. There is no word yet on Spall’s role in the film.
While the presence of Freddie Stroma (Cormac McLaggen) in the popular Netflix series Bridgerton has come as a surprise to some viewers, anyone who’s been following our casting updates should know better! Beyond the Regency series, though, Stroma has been cast in a Netflix comedy series focused on NASCAR, titled The Crew. People reports that Stroma will play a racecar driver named Jake, and the series will be released on February 15. A trailer for The Crew has already been released, and you can watch it below!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAj4FnUhGWE
Luke Youngblood (Lee Jordan) has also made his way to Netflix, as the voice of Frostee Benson in the third season of Fast & Furious: Spy Racers Sahara. The third season of the children’s series dropped on Netflix on December 26, according to parenting website Moms.
When it comes to her red representation of London, Kravitz created No. 143 London Sky and No. 144 Shoreditch Walk, deep nudes with a red undertone. For LA, she created two burgundy reds, No. 149 Midnight LA and No. 150 Topanga Sunset and for New York City, she went with a pure red in No. 147 Brooklyn Baby and No. 148 NYC Jungle. Paris is represented with two romantic orange reds, No. 145 Lost in Marias and No. 146 Paris Stroll.
The limited-edition Rouge Pur Couture lipstick shades are available now from YSL Beauty.
Mads Mikkelsen, who has now replaced Johnny Depp in the role of Gellert Grindelwald, appears in a new advertising campaign for Carlsberg, a Danish brewing company, and its Carlsberg 00 non-alcoholic beer. Mikkelsen shared the ad to his Instagram account.
Ezra Miller (Credence Barebone) is also part of the DC Extended Universe as the Flash, and the superhero will be featured in an upcoming Justice League miniseries from HBO Max based on Zack Snyder’s original cut of the 2017 film. Heroic Hollywood teased some information about the miniseries, primarily as it pertains to Ben Affleck as Batman. According to that article, the miniseries will be released in March. Ciarán Hinds will also be featured in this version as Steppenwolf.
’The War Below’ is based on true events and centers on a group of British miners recruited during WWI to tunnel underneath no man’s land and set bombs from below the German front, all in the hopes of breaking the deadly stalemate of the Battle of Messines.
The Wrap additionally notes that The War Below has wrapped production, so we could see the film relatively soon.
That’s all for this edition of Casting News, but stay tuned for even more great updates! Until then, be sure to tell us your thoughts in the comments below!
