'Westworld' Cast, News: Anthony Hopkins To Star In HBO TV Series For First Time
HBO is going to bring "Westworld" to the small screen next year and has signed up Anthony Hopkins, Ed Harris and a number of other stars to appear in it.
The series is going to be fashioned around the 1973 Michael Crichton film of the same name. It will be penned by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy and will see Hopkins step into the role of a series regular for the first time. He will play the part of an inventor who creates an amusement park for adults that uses life-like robots instead of people.
J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot Productions will be involved in producing the series along with Jerry Weintraub Productions. The pilot for the series has already been directed by Nolan.
The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that the robots in the series will be played by an ensemble cast that includes James Marsden, Evan Rachel Wood, Harris, Miranda Otto, Jeffrey Wright and Thandie Newton. Since the characters are robots, even if they are killed off in each season they may return in the next as completely different characters or names.
This creative flexibility in the series gives the cast the ability to play a number of different characters. It also means that unlike in other anthological series, the cast on this series has signed on for a number of years.
Entertainment Weekly notes that Ed Harris will most probably don the role of the central villain in the series. In the original "Westworld" film, the killer cowboy robot was played by Yul Brynner .
It also notes that Brazilian star Rodrigo Santoro tried out for the role which eventually went to Harris. Sources say Harris will actually be a human, not a robot, cowboy who is a sadist and likes abusing the robots.
