Netflix is making an adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman, the author’s wildly imaginative comic book series about dreams, death, desire and everything. It may be his best work, and so far, Netflix looks like it’s hitting the show out of the park, at least so far as casting is concerned. The dour Tom Sturridge as main character Morpheus, the lord of the Dreaming? Game of Thrones veteran Gwendoline Christie as Lucifer, the ruler of hell? Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister) as the wicked magician Roderick Burgess? Yes to all of this.
And now they’ve made another perfect choice. Stephen Fry — the venerated English actor known for his roles in A Bit of Fry & Laurie, Wilde, Gosford Park, V for Vendetta and many more — let slip that he’s on the show during a brief interview in between cricket coverage on Channel 4 in the UK, according to Metro. “It’s part of what we call the DC Universe but it’s really its own thing,” the actor said. “I’m really looking forward to that, I’ve not been in anything quite like it before. I suppose the Hobbit counts as a fantasy world.”
Yes, The Hobbit’s Middle-earth most definitely counts as a fantasy world — maybe the fantasy world, but let’s not dwell on that, because Fry also revealed his role. “I’m playing a kind of Edwardian writer figure called Gilbert.”
Who is Stephen Fry playing in The Sandman?
Gilbert is introduced pretty early in the series. He’s a friendly older writer who accompanies Rose Walker after she gets caught up in the plot of a nightmare creature known as the Corinthian, who escaped from the Dreaming while Morpheus is incapacitated. In ends up that Gilbert himself is also from the Dreaming, a realm where everything people have dreamed is real…sort of. Gilbert is actually Fiddler’s Green, a kind of imagined heaven for sailors, in human form.
If that sounds a little weird, get used to it, because that kind of thing is all over The Sandman, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. And the witty, avuncular Fry seems perfect for the part. Netflix has yet to misstep. We don’t know when The Sandman is coming out, but the more I hear about it, the more excited I get.
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