Cillian Murphy will be returning for the new 28 Years Later trilogy of films – but, and look away if you don’t want to know, his involvement isn’t straightforward.
Ever since it was revealed back in February that we’d be getting another film in the 28 Days Later series, the good news tap hasn’t turned off.
Danny Boyle and Alex Garland are back to reprise their creative partnership of director and writer. Cillian Murphy – the star of the original film – publicly declared that he was making himself ‘available’ and if all of that wasn’t good enough, we then heard that no less than Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Ralph Fiennes would lead the cast for the new film.
Now, thanks to a report from Jeff Sneider (via World Of Reel), we’ve got an insight regarding Cillian Murphy’s involvement.
According to Sneider, Murphy won’t appear in the first film at all. Instead, his character will be briefly introduced in the planned second film (which will be directed by Candyman's Nia DaCosta) before making a full appearance in the third film. We don’t know who is due to helm that one yet, but given the rate that news is emerging for these 28 Years Later projects, we likely will before the week is out.
The first two films are due to be shot in succession, with the production slated to go before cameras next month. (There’s also our story that the production is currently looking for ‘athletic’ people for the shoot – presumably to play Rage-infected, teeth-gnashing extras.)
As for Murphy, we were wondering how he was planning to fit everything in given that his slate in the wake of Oppenheimer has begun to look busy. He will lead the cast of Steven Knight’s planned Peaky Blinders movie which is set to shoot in September and then there’s his planned take on Claire Keegan’s acclaimed novel, Small Things Like These. That one’s being backed by Artists Equity, the production company formed by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck.
He’s also recently signed up for the drama, Blood Runs Coal.
Now we know that Murphy will mostly be appearing in the third film, we wonder if that means Boyle will return to direct it. Or perhaps Alex Garland will take a crack at it. We don’t know yet, but it’s been a fun journey so far, finding out which direction these films are taking. We’ll bring you more on Sony’s planned trilogy of 28 Days Later flicks when we hear it.
