From the creators of The Walking Dead & Fear the Walking Dead comes a brand new series that delves deep into the dark world of demonic possessions.
Outcast, based on the Skybound/Image comic title by creator Robert Kirkman and artist Paul Azaceta, follows Kyle Barnes, a young man who has been plagued by demonic possession all his life. Now, with the help of Reverend Anderson, a country preacher with personal demons of his own, Kyle embarks on a journey to find answers and obtain a normal life he has never known. But what Kyle discovers could change his fate — and the fate of the world — forever.
In a central London hotel, an exclusive interview took place with the two main stars, Philip Glenister & Patrick Fugit. Reporters from Virgin Media, NME, freecinema.gr & of course, TVMaze were on hand to ask the questions….
How did you get involved in the show? Was there an audition process?
Philip: Yeah, I had to go through an audition process. I got a phone call from my agent saying he wanted me to go on tape for this new Robert Kirkwood series. I was like “Who’s Robert Kirkman?” & he said, from The Walking Dead.
Lorraine Mayfield, our casting director who cast the pilot, had seen me in a couple of British things & she thought I’d be interesting for the part of The Reverend, so I put myself on tape, thinking that I’d hear nothing more, as you do, and I forgot about it & they came back and said they’re really interested actually. So, I had a Skype call with Robert & Chris Black (The show runner) & basically, I invited myself over to L.A. to screen test with Patrick, who they were very interested in for Kyle.
We did a chemistry test with Gabriel (who plays Joshua) & he was extraordinary We were like “Who is this kid?” and he gave me a lift back to the hotel & I thought “I like Patrick Keagan, nice fella. Very nice fella! I could spend time with him” and, uhm, yeah, there you go!
Partick: Similar for me. You know, we had to work for it. Lorraine, who is very supportive of me. She cast me in Gone Girl. She’s very smart and really awesome. Really cool, and she brought me in and I think that my read-on file was enough to get me to the next stage and we sort of worked out some kinks made some adjustments & then it, you know, went from there.
Did you guys have any fun on set?
Philip: No! None! No, it was miserable. It was awful! (Laughter). No.of course we had fun. I mean, you have to have fun.
Patrick: We have a good structure. Like, we have a great creative team who were really fun to work with, The actors were all really great.
Philip: It’s your family! Everyone's away from home at the time & if you don’t get on, you can have a really horrible time. So, you become very close to people. You work hard, you play hard, but were also so tired at weekends.
Patrick: Yeah, it’s a very intense and busy schedule. Some scenes were a lot more intense than others, but, you know, a lot of our scenes particularly involved an organic interaction of natural feeling characters, which is really fun to play.
Philip: Yeah, and we were given the freedom. Like, they weren’t all that kind of “Stick to the script”, “Don’t say that”, “You missed an and”.
We were filming in July & it was boiling hot & we were dripping with sweat we were just going crazy like “This is f*****g insane!”, and we’re shooting this scene and we just started laughing & giggling.
You pulled it off really well, but your American accent; how much practice did it take to get it just right?
Philip: I just stayed in the accent the whole time I was out there. It’s the easiest thing to do. Why wouldn’t I? It’s just easier.
Patrick: Yeah, I found myself doing the southern (Accent) while we were shooting.
Philip: I kinda enjoy it. After a while, I started to actually believe I was from Rock Hill. It was good, the challenge, to see if you could actually fool people to think you’re from there. I did get a bit fed up with everyone saying “You have a great day”. I knew I was gonna be on set till 3am, so I wanted to say “I was gonna have a s**t day”.
How long did it take to shoot season one?
Patrick: Five months. We’ve got picked up for season two, which is nice.
Now that’s it’s been renewed for season two, how much do you know about what’s coming up?
Patrick: One of the elements that's interesting is to see how his storytelling has evolved since The Walking Dead and the fact that he has this entire new world to start all that stuff in. I’ve heard that season two is intense. The end of season one is a high note & season two is gonna continue on that same pitch.
The first episode begins with a pretty gruesome scene. It’s quite shocking.
Philip: That’s one of the things that is the difference between American TV & British TV. British TV execs look at that and go “Uhhhh, the audience won't like that” but, in America, they just show that and are like “This is the show. Take it or leave it. We’ve shown you the first minute and this is the sort of show we’re making. So, either turn over now or continue watching”.
Was there anything on set during filming that made you step back; anything that turned your stomach?
Patrick: I kinda like that stuff. Like, because it’s a story and it’s all within the context of the show. Like, the beginning of episode two; that’s unsettling. That made me uncomfortable, but in like, the best way.
Philip: We've said all along. The thing about it, there’s such strong characters & such a good story that when you do get these moments that are very unsettling, we feel we sort of earnt them. We’ve earned the right to show them and have them in the story. It’s not just there for gratuitous purposes.
How do you feel about your comic book characters? Did you use them as a reference point at all?
Patrick: There’s so much more happening in the show because we have so many more tools, but I think, initially, we drew a lot of mood and physicality from the comics.
But then, the writing of the first few episodes was very self explanatory and very rich in terms of character, so I think I was able to just transition and start using the scripts mostly for that sort of thing. Hopefully, they’re not too dissimilar.
Philip: I thought my comic book character looked like a cross between Elton John and Philip Seymour Hoffman
Can you talk about some of the demons you encounter?
Patrick: I think one of the biggest plot points is Reverend and Kyle figuring out like, what the rules are. Like, how the one in episode three defers from the one in episode one. A lot of episode two is Kyle reflecting on what’s happened to this little boy & wondering why it was different with his mother and that sort of thing.
It feels like the Reverend is starting to doubt
Patrick: Yeah, absolutely. We both have opposing views. Like, Kyle is in denial and writes it off as a mental illness, and then, at the end of the first episode, they’re both like “What is happening?” and then as it goes on, we start to question our beliefs & learn more and more.
That concluded the interview. Everyone said their thanks and goodbyes, and we all went our separate ways.
For anyone still not sure about the show, here’s some info about the two main characters from Outcast.
Philip Glenister as Reverend Anderson
Reverend Anderson is the local country preacher with his own personal demons and history of loss. Though he may have less-than-Godly attributes, the Reverend is pure of heart and tends to his congregation and community first and foremost, including Kyle Barnes who looks to him as the only father figure he’s ever known
Patrick Fugit as Kyle Barnes
Haunted by the terrors of his childhood and the abrupt end to his marriage, Kyle Barnes has been plagued by demonic possession all his life. As Kyle begins to escape isolation and slowly re-enter life in his small town, he seeks answers to his lifelong living hell to try and piece his life back together – the life he wants, not the life inflicted upon him.
Here's a trailer to the series
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Having seen the first four episodes, I can confirm it’s a pretty dark, shocking and gruesome series. Definitely not for the faint hearted. The opening scene alone will either have you screaming for more or switching off in disgust. I loved it!
Outcast airs Friday nights on Cinemax in the USA from June 3rd & on Tuesday nights on FOX in the UK from June 7th.
Please do share your thoughts and comments below,. I look forward to reading them.
Written by TonyMayhew on Jun 3, 2016
Might give it a watch some time, could be good
It's a good serie, but need more action.
Coming from the creators of the train wreck known as TWD, let's hope this doesn't let us down as well.
Hm. Could be interesting. Definitely one way to kill an hour of time and it not be a total waste. Knock on wood.
I want to watch it. But idk if it is thaaat good.
FtWD is just a redo of an already shown story, without much new if any whatsoever added to it. The characters are quite good though, and the story as well to an extend, but it just doesn't do much for anyone having already watched a similar story in the exact same setting.
Outcast on the other hand is a new and entirely different story, so you really can't compare the two. Of course it's also a somewhat used concept, and if you've watched The Exorcist and other movies in that genre, you'll know what it's about. It still has a lot of episodes to go on though, and having only introduced the setting, rules and characters so far with the first two episodes, it still has quite a lot of playground to make for something quite interesting.
Again though, so far it's definitely decent, without being great. I'm looking forward to watching the third episode though. Hopefully it'll bring a little more meat on the bone now that we're done with most of the introduction :)
If it's anywhere as bad as 'Fear the Walking Dead' I shall be giving it a miss.
Decent indeed, not great. Looking forward to seeing more of it though and can definitely recommend giving it a chance.