The creatures are stirring
Orlando Bloom explores new ID as 'Carnival Row' returns
With a career that spans Shakespeare on Broadway, indie films and the enduring “Lord of the Rings,” “The Hobbit’ and “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchises, Orlando Bloom had decided to take a break.
Then came “Carnival Row,” an elaborate effects-laden fantasy whose concluding Season 2 streams on
Prime Video Friday.
“I’d taken some time to just raise my son and be with my wife,” Bloom, 46, said of his high-profile marriage to Miranda Kerr and his now 12-yearold. They divorced and he is now engaged to Katy Perry, with whom he welcomed a daughter.
“Then ‘Carnival Row’ came along and I’d never read a literate script like it. I thought, ‘Wow! Steampunk Victorian-era fantasy. Thrilling drama. Detective, noir story! It’s ambitious — and if we handle it, it’ll be really unique.’
“And I feel that we have. And we did. I had great fun with that character.”
That would be former Inspector Rycroft Philostrate — aka Philo — who in this mythical world sees the winged fae as a persecuted migrant minority. Cara Delavigne co-stars as Vignette Stonemoss, a fae and Philo’s ex-lover.
“Ultimately, we find out in Season 1 is that he’s been institutionalized — raised in an orphanage, served in the military and then a detective.
“All the while he’s keeping this secret that he is, in fact, half-fae. Meaning,” Bloom said during a Zoom interview, “that that can be transferable to anything, any kind of character in the world. Maybe he’s got issues with his sexuality.
“If that secret that he is half-fae were to be revealed, it would be the end of his life as he knew it. In Season 2 we find him in Carnival Row, accepting that’s who he is. We figure, Great!
“But is it as simple as that? Of course not! Now on Carnival Row he’s got to figure out what that means and come to terms with that. He now feels the responsibility of being a fae, the understanding of the people that he came from.
“It’s a very interesting commentary on a man’s journey, on the messiness of life. Jung” — the famous psychoanalyst — “talks about the ‘shadow self’ and in Episode 6 I get to physicalize the ‘shadow self.’
“That’s a great device for explaining the character, a rough guy who doesn’t show any kind of emotional stuff.”
Bloom’s approach to Philo was to make him, “This jester-Shakespearean, crazy sociopathic guy. I got to go very deep in the character and also have the physicality of the character come alive.
“Fantasy,” he’s now decided, “is a really great device for exploring social commentary in the world. I think it does that very well.”
“Carnival Row Season 2” streams on Prime Video Feb. 17