The publication of Kyle Buchanan’s book Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road has shed some interesting light on the casting process for the upcoming Mad Max prequel Furiosa, as reported by SlashFilm. We already knew that Anya Taylor-Joy would be playing the younger Furiosa, but now there’s confirmation that Chris Hemsworth will be taking on the role of the lead villain. But it doesn’t sound like director George Miller was always on board with him being in the film in that capacity.
In the book, Mad Max: Fury Road producer and first assistant director P.J. Voeten explains that “George saw Chris [Hemsworth] initially as a courtesy and then fell in love with the idea. He’s going to play totally against type, the lead baddie. Unfortunately, we’ve got to find all of our other characters that aren’t around anymore: a new Immortan, a new Bullet Farmer, and a few others.” This makes reference to the fact that actors Richard Carter and Hugh Keays-Byrne, who played Immortan and Bullet Farmer, respectively, in previous films, are no longer alive, and appears to indicate that his character will be someone new rather than a character we’ve seen in the Mad Max universe before. Though Hemsworth is best known for playing heroes like the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Thor, ScreenRant notes that he has played bad guys before, in A Perfect Getaway and Bad Times at the El Royale.
Furiosa, which is on track to be Australia’s biggest movie ever and was pushed this past September to a Memorial Day Weekend 2024 release, is set to open on May 24th, 2024. Taylor-Joy will be playing the title character, part of an intensive back-to-back work schedule that Taylor-Joy indicated in a Variety interview will have her just as busy as she was doing Emma, The Queen’s Gambit, and Last Night in Soho in succession. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II was originally set to co-star but has been replaced by Tom Burke due to scheduling conflicts. Miller will direct once again, as he has for every installment in the series, in addition to producing, and writing with Nico Lathouris, his collaborator on the script for Mad Max: Fury Road.