Dan Stevens of Downton Abbey and Parks and Recreation’s Aubrey Plaza have joined the cast of FX’s X-Men spin-off Tv series Legion, the Hollywood Reporter has learned.
Dan Stevens is best known for his three seasons as Matthew Crawley in Downton, but is also making a name for himself in film – he will star as Beast alongside Emma Watson in the upcoming live action Beauty and the Beast.
Returning to TV, Stevens will play David Haller, which HR describes as “a man who may be more than human and who has struggled with mental illness since his teenage years. Diagnosed as schizophrenic, David has been in and out of psychiatric hospitals for years. But after a strange encounter with a fellow patient, he is confronted with the possibility that the voices he hears and the visions he sees might be real.”
Haller is the son of X-Men’s Charles Xavier and Israeli Holocaust survivor Gabrielle Haller.
Plaza will play Haller’s friend Lenny “who, despite a life of drugs and alcohol abuse, knows that any day now her life is going to turn around”.
Previously cast for the pilot was Rachel Keller, recently seen in Fargo Season 2, who will play female lead, Syd, a “self-sufficient and street smart woman who uses her sharp and prickly demeanor to protect her soft core because even though it makes her a sucker and puts her at risk, she still believes in happily ever after”.
FX will begin production on Legion in March.
Source: Hollywood Reporter
