CARNIVAL ROW
As in ‘street’, rather than fights between people in big rainbow headdresses.
From Middle-earth to World’s End, Orlando Bloom is a seasoned traveller of fantastic realms. But even his eyes popped when he ventured onto Carnival Row. “I really felt like I hadn’t seen this world before,” marvels the actor. “When I was on the set of Lord Of The Rings, it was a mind-blowing experience. The bar had been set so high. But I was so overjoyed to walk down the Row and see the level of detail.”
He’s quick to offer examples. “So there’s a shop, with this sort of witchy fairy called the Haruspex [played by Alice Krige], who’s got all these potions, and there are these creatures in jars… And then there are the cards – tarot cards, with snakeskin on the back. I geek out over stuff like that, you know?”
Geek is the word. Bloom is talking to Small Screen at San Diego ComicCon – the ideal launchpad for an eight-hour series set in a mythological, alt-Victorian world dreamt up by a writer, Travis Beacham, whose credits include Pacific Rim, the Clash Of The Titans remake and Electric Dreams.
But while Carnival Row (an Amazon Original) promises immersion, it’s far from outright escapism. Its be-winged
whimsy is grounded in social relevance: Carnival Row is a place where tensions are brewing between humans and an array of immigrant creatures in flight from their war-battered homelands.
“This show is very timely,” asserts Bloom. “It feels like it speaks to a lot of the issues that are happening in the world today, particularly the migrant refugee crisis.” The fantastical context, he believes, allows the show to “examine, with real humanity, some of the tragic, desperate situations that are going on, but with an objective eye… it’s so beautifully handled by Travis and Marc [Guggenheim, executive producer].”
Bloom stars as Rycroft Philostrate, a (human) detective investigating the murder of a showgirl on the Row. “He’s a man of secrets,” Bloom reveals. “[In real life] I can sometimes be guilty of over-communicating, of wearing my heart on my sleeve, so it was wonderful to play a character who’s so guarded.” The actor shares above-the-title billing – and a noirishly romantic plotline – with Cara Delevingne, who plays Vignette Stonemoss, a refugee fairy also harbouring a secret or two. “Vignette has been through a lot, she’s lost a lot,” Delevingne explains. “But she still manages to keep going, to get back up and continue fighting for what she believes in – which is love.”
TO THE MANOR FAUN
Other Carnival Row-ers include mysterious, monied faun Agreus (David Gyasi); Imogen Spurnrose (Tamzin Merchant), a young member of an aristocratic clan down on its luck; Piety and Absalom Breakspear (Indira Varma, Jared Harris), members of the family who boss the city of The Burgue; and fairy poet Tourmaline (Under The
Dome’s Karla Crome). We could list more, but we’ve only got two pages. “The amount of characters in this world, the ways they interlink and interweave, and the thought that’s gone into all that, is just incredible,” raves Delevingne.
“One of the adjectives that’s come up a lot is ‘Dickensian’,” adds Beacham, who originated the show with his Hollywood Blacklisted spec script A Killing On Carnival Row. “Usually Dickensian means ‘it’s Victorian, with a lot of characters’, but what I’ve tried to do is wrestle with the issues of the time in a way that’s personal but doesn’t become a polemic.” Beacham also doffs his cap to the world-building of Frank Herbert’s Dune.
‘it speaks to a lot of issues, particularly the refugee crisis’ Orlando Bloom
But one literary giant who’s off the table is George Orwell, according to Guggenheim. “We try not to hit anything too firmly on the head – like when you’re reading Animal Farm and can pick out who represents whom. We want to talk about issues without it becoming an allegory, or a parable.”
The big goal? “To create a world that feels real in and of itself,” Guggenheim continues. Two of the keys to reaching that goal? Convincing wings. And hairy legs. “Vignette’s wings are like, half and half,” reveals Beacham, “sometimes prosthetic, sometimes CG.” (“Don’t tell them that!” says Delevingne, with mock dismay.) The wings are designed to behave like limbs, he continues. “And one of the most interesting questions is what they’re doing when they’re not helping [Vignette] fly.”
FUR PLAY
As for those hairy pins, they’re a dream come true for actor David Gyasi. “I’ve always wanted leg muscles,” he sighs. “My dad had muscly legs – and I got my mum’s legs!” Describing his new faun legs as “incredible”, he highlights how the FX team stuck on “thousands of individual hairs”, rendering the illusion – like so much of Carnival Row – wholly organic. “When [Agreus] walks, everything breathes and moves, like an animal,” says Gyasi. “That level of detail is worth the five-hour makeup call!” Matthew Leyland
CARNIVAL ROW WILL BE AVAILABLE ON AMAZON PRIME VIDEO FROM 30 AUGUST.