Amazon Studios has announced further casting on the highly-anticipated series The Power, a timely 10-part global thriller based on the international bestselling novel of the same name, produced by Sister (Chernobyl, Giri/Haji, The Split) for Amazon Studios with Emmy Award-winning executive producer and director Reed Morano (The Handmaid’s Tale).
Rob Delaney (Catastrophe) will play Tom, a silver fox news anchor loved by the audience – authoritative but warm, a reassuring presence. His younger co-anchor Kristen, played by Alice Eve (Before We Go), is smarter than she looks. She’s ambitious too. Together, they chart the slow but inexorable change in attitudes as the phenomenon unfolds.
Academy Award-winning Tim Robbins (Here and Now, Mystic River, Shawshank Redemption) will play Daniel Dandon, the self-righteous and self-important Republican Governor of Washington State and constant thorn in the side of Margot Cleary-Lopez, the Democratic Mayor of Seattle (Leslie Mann). Edwina Findley (Treme, If Loving You Is Wrong, Fear the Walking Dead) plays Helen, her highly competent and trusted advisor. Margot’s husband Rob is played by the previously-announced John Leguizamo, and her two younger children, Matty and Izzy, are played by Gerrison Machado and Pietra Castro.
In the power-corridors of Eastern Europe, Zrinka Cvitešić (London Spy, Capital) plays Tatiana Moskalev, wife of Moldovan President Viktor Moskalev, fiercely intelligent, a born survivor, and capable of so much more than most of the men around her realise.
Joining the East London Monke family, headed by patriarch Bernie (the previously-announced Eddie Marsan) are Jacob Fortune-Lloyd (The Queen’s Gambit) as the charming Ricky, Sam Buchanan (You Wouldn’t Adam and Eve It) as slow-witted Terry, and Archie Rush (Black Mirror) as the youngest of the three brothers, Darrell. Juliet Cowan (Cuckoo, Killed by My Debt) plays Barbara, Bernie’s wife and mother to his three sons and heirs. Ria Zmitrowicz (previously-announced) plays his illegitimate teenage daughter Roxy.
Simbi Ajikawo (Top Boy, Youngers), also known as Little Simz, plays Adunola, who gives Nigerian aspiring journalist Tunde (the previously-announced Toheeb Jimoh) his first experience of the Power.
The world of The Power is our world, but for one twist of nature. Suddenly, and without warning, all teenage girls in the world develop the power to electrocute people at will. It’s hereditary, it’s inbuilt, and it can’t be taken away from them. The Power follows a cast of remarkable characters from London to Seattle, Nigeria to Moldova, as the Power evolves from a tingle in teenagers’ collarbones to a complete reversal of the power balance of the world.
The Power is adapted for screen by writer, creator and executive producer Naomi Alderman, writer and executive producer Claire Wilson, and writer and co-executive producer Sarah Quintrell, working alongside an all-female writers’ room including Stacy Osei-Kuffour, Rebecca Levene and Whit Anderson. Neasa Hardiman (Jessica Jones, Happy Valley) and Lisa Gunning (whose editing credits include Fifty Shades of Grey, Seven Psychopaths and Nowhere Boy), join the all-women directing team of Reed Morano, Shannon Murphy (multi-award winning Babyteeth, Killing Eve) and Ugla Hauksdóttir (Hanna, Ófærð).
Picture: Luke Fontana
