The challenge of handling a cast like
Y The Last Man's is that most of the diverse range of roles that's usually handled by men is impossible in this Unmanned World. As such, it requires that the vast range of dramatic heft be carried on the shoulders of women, who have to a minor extent, not been given as much dramatic range in cinema. For this cast, I tried to go dig up actors with equally diverse niches --- big budget regulars, TV talent, artsy types --- all in various stages in their careers: up and coming names, veterans and decidedly under the radar ones.
Clockwise from upper left: Chris Evans, N'Bushe Wright, Michaela Conlin, Joan Allen,
Rachel Nichols, Mili Avital and Neve Campbell
Yorick Brown - Look past
Chris Evans' generic hunktitude looks and you'll see an actor who is committed to more than just being a conventional leading man. Evans is severely under-rated in spite of his rapidly improving resume in films like
Cellular, where he played a young man who's self-centered on most days, but does the right thing under pressure and
Sunshine, where he played an engineer with the righteous determination to get things done. Combine that with the inherent schmuckness of his Johnny Storm and you've got Yorick Brown --- underachiever, slacker, escape artist and lover of teh cranberry stuffed turkey. I will defend this choice to the death. Even VVD agrees. To paraphrase his PM to me:
"Yorick is the genius slacker. Evans' Johnny Storm is just that one of the elite few to go into space, yet just wants to get chicks.
The scene where he says that cranberry sauce is too awesome to only serve once a year? In my mind I'm having actors stuff a big portion of cranberry sauce in their mouth and saying that line. Their lips still wet and juicy from the sauce.....their left cheek fat with an excess amount of cranberry sauce being held until they can finish the line and down some more sauce.
I can see Evans doing that and pulling it off. I wholeheartedly endorse Evans."
Agent 355 - A presence in gritty urban television fare like
Homicide and
Third Watch,
N'Bushe Wright won critical acclaim for her portrayal of a Black Panther idealist in
Dead Presidents and earned praises for her performance in Boaz Yakin's
Fresh. Wright is best recognized as Dr. Karen Jenson, mortician turned reluctant toughie from
Blade, and is more than capable of handling the role of Agent 355, ostracized orphan turned government operative.
Dr. Alison Mann - The good doctor is far from being just another
Asian American model minority. She rebelled against her parents by abandoning their names. She rejects the heterosexual norm in favor of lesbianism. But most of all she rejected the draconian ethics of scientific convention by impregnating herself with her own clone. To play Alison Mann, you need not just any Asian-American with experience playing smart women, but one with the ability to combine that package with a feisty spirit. Enter
Michaela Conlin, best known as wild-child' facial reconstructionist Angela Montenegro from TV's
Bones.
Representative Jennifer Brown - Academy AWard nominee and Tony Award winner
Joan Allen is an actor who has brought consummate professionalism to films like
Manhunter and
Searching for Bobby Fischer. Though some people might recall her as a frail mother figure for her roles in
Pleasantvilleu and
The Ice Storm. She's also played some strong figures like CIA Deputy Director Pamela Landy in
The Bourne Supremacy, but it was in
The Contender that she caught my eye, where she played a Vice Presidential nominee who refuses to dignify scandalous gossip about her even when the rumors prove to be false. As Jennifer Brown, she has to combine the tough, the maternal and the snarky into one feisty little congresswoman, and she most certainly can.
Beth DeVille - I'd call upon
Rachel Nichols who plays the rookie government operative Rachel Gibson in TV's
Alias to play the outdoorsy young woman who Yorick intended to marry. Nichols also has extensive experience handling suspense, thriller and horror fare with a resume that includes films like
The Amityville Horror and
The Woods and has done this by combining her natural good looks with an ability to suggest vulnerability with competence, without looking like a female toughie. One can easily see her haunting the dreams of the Last Man on Earth.
Alter Tse'elon - I really wanted an Israeli born performer to take this part, and I chose
Mili Avital who has successfully transitioned from a stage and film career in Israel to films like Wim Wenders'
The End of Violence and the BBC miniseries'
Arabian nights. She is probably most recognized by fans of sci-fi as Shau'ri the Abydonian from Roland Emmerich's
Stargate. But what clinches the deal for her to play Alter Tse'elon, is her role as a Jewish freedom fighter from the NBC miniseries
The Uprising which was based on the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
Hero Brown - To play the police officer turned feminist extremist with a self-mutilated breast, I choose
Neve Campbell. Her mundane likeability from TV's
Party of Five hasn't actually translated into high profile success, but she's been carefully operating under the radar with films like
Partition and
When Will I Be Loved, but it's her discombobulating performance as the manipulative trailer trash from the schlocky "will never die on cable" thriller
Wild Things that shows she has what it takes to play a responsible ex-copper who's been tilted slightly on the edge by the unmanned apocalypse.
