In the past, I’ve written about who I’d cast in a film version of my novels. JK Rowling famously put forward her ideas of who should play the adults in the Harry Potter films and by and large got her wish. Alan Rickman and Maggie Smith were her first choices to play Snape and McGonagall for example. And it’s claimed that she had an image of Robbie Coltrane in her head when writing Hagrid.
For my part, I’ve ‘cast’ five of my books in the past. You can see my reasons behind the casting of Eternally & Evermore and Kissed by a Rose here. And the casting of Reunion, Charlotte’s Secret and Lost & Found can be found here. You’ll notice I gave the lovely Emma Watson a part. (Which isn’t the only thing I’d like to give her, believe me).
But what about my Tutelam Venit series? Who could possibly take on those roles? Well, this is where things could get a little off track. In looking into writing this post, I realised that the ‘cast’ of the series is pretty big.
Take A Good Man. There are four characters in the prologue and epilogue which is set in the future, although, admittedly, one of them is in a coffin. Then there are five ‘historic characters’ who could appear in flashbacks (as well as two characters from the present as younger versions of themselves). So we’re up to a ‘cast’ of ten even before we look at the main bulk of the story.
That contains seventeen teenagers, fourteen adults (five of which have made appearances in earlier books) and three members of the football team who are named and a couple of other goons who aren’t.
So that’s thirty-four characters from the present day, two of which may feature in flashbacks as younger versions of themselves and two of which appear in the prologue as older versions of themselves, another one character from the future (although, we don’t actually know her identity yet beyond the fact that she’s “Paul’s Wife”), and then five more characters from the past in flashback.
Shit, how did I end up writing so many damn characters?
As for A Tortured Soul by my current reckoning I’m up to twenty-two new characters, thirteen from the first book plus the voice of another character from A Good Man, and know I’ve missed a couple of the list I’m keeping as a guide while I write, plus, I’ve not finished the book yet, or written the prologue or epilogue.
So how many different actors is that altogether? I’ve lost count, hang on….
It’s 66. Unless my maths is wrong. Which it might be.
Sixty-bloody-six. Well, sod that for a game of soldiers. There’s no way I’m thinking up people to play all those. Tell you what, if you have any suggestions, why not make them in the comment section below. This could be fun actually. Who do you see playing Paul and Clarissa? Or Emily and Grace? Or the Simms twins? Let me know your thoughts. There must loads of young British actors and actress who’d do a good job, like Nicholas Hoult here.
Keep this in mind though. We need to find a spot for the lovely Jenna Louise Coleman. (My current Doctor Who crush).
