Bruce Greenwood replacing Frank Langella on Mike Flanagan’s Fall Of The House Of Usher
Greenwood, who previously worked with Flanagan on Gerald's Game and Doctor Sleep, is taking over the role on the Netflix miniseries
Aux News Bruce Greenwood
Netflix has found its replacement for the fired Frank Langella on its Poe adaptation The Fall Of The House Of Usher today, with Deadline reporting that Bruce Greenwood has signed on to fill in the vacant role on the upcoming miniseries
Greenwood currently stars on The Resident on Fox, a medical drama in which he plays a surgeon with a propensity… for death! (Because his skills are diminishing, but his ego is not, and he’s thus responsible for multiple instances of covered-up malpractice.) Greenwood is, in any case, a veteran actor who works basically constantly; you might know him from his voice work as Batman in recent DC Animated projects; for his work on shows like American Crime Story; and, of course, as the guy who used to show up to be Captain Kirk’s not-dad in Star Trek movies, back when they used to make those. (He also, probably not coincidentally, is an old pal of Usher creator Mike Flanagan, appearing in his Stephen King adaptations Gerald’s Game and Doctor Sleep. Per an interview with Flanagan, Greenwood also had an uncredited cameo in the director’s Netflix hit The Haunting Of Hill House, haunting his old Game co-star Carla Gugino.)
Greenwood is joining the Netflix Usher show as Roderick Usher, a part previously portrayed by Langella—until he was removed from the production in mid-April after an investigation into “inappropriate behavior” by the actor on the show’s set. Usher is depicted as a younger man in the Poe story on which the miniseries is based, but clearly Flanagan is doing some moving around of the timeline with his version.
The Fall Of The House Of Usher was reportedly about halfway through its shooting schedule when Langella was ousted; at the time, representatives for the miniseries said they’d continue shooting around the scenes centered on the Roderick character until, apparently, Bruce Greenwood’s agent could be reached.
5 Comments
I like this switch. Flangella is Flangella, so it’s not like you can match that level, but Greenwood has done some really good work and is a good fit for this character.As odd as it sounds, I almost feel that Greenwood might work better in a Flanagan productionthat Flangella as the former has that more approachable energy the director often goes for.
Yep. This is unequivocally an upgrade.
Man, the more I think about this switch, the more excited I am about it.If this was a Del Toro like ethereal gothic horror, then Langella without a doubt would be superior, but in how Flanagan tells stories it is difficult to see how Langella wouldn’t just feel off. While there’s so much that can be done with Greenwood and how he can play with that tragedy while coming across as an actual person.
I wonder why Flanagan didn’t cast Greenwood in the first place, since he clearly likes going back to the well with his casts.
I think the only work of Poe which merits a miniseries treatment might be the Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. It doesn’t have a very satisfactory ending though.
I’ll take it. He’s always solid.