Academy Award winner Jeremy Irons has joined the limited series The Count of Monte Cristo, Variety reported.
Sam Claflin will star as the sailor Edmond Dantès, who assumes the identity of the Count after he escapes captivity. He was falsely accused of treason and imprisoned without trial in on the island fortress Château d’If.
Irons will play Abbé Faria, Dantès’ fellow inmate. Faria educates him during their long imprisonment and tells him about the treasure he found. After Dantès escapes, he uses this treasure to seek revenge on those who were responsible for his captivity.
Joining Irons and Claflin are Ana Girardot, Mikkel Boe Følsgaard, Blake Ritson, Karla-Simone Spence, Michele Riondino, Lino Guanciale, Gabriella Pession and Nicolas Maupas.
Palme d’Or winning director Bille August told Variety he wanted to do the project because it’s “all about relationships, the complexities of human beings and in that sense it’s very modern and timeless.”
Producer Carlo Degli Esposti said that the series will take on “a modern edge while remaining faithful to the legacy of Alexandre Dumas’ work.”
There have been several film adaptations of Dumas’ novel. The most recent one was the 2002 movie starring Jim Caviezel and Guy Pearce. The late Richard Harris played Faria.
Claflin’s first big Hollywood role was as Finnick Odair in The Hunger Games series. He most recently played Billy Dunne in Prime Video’s Daisy Jones & the Six.
Irons won an Academy Award in 1991 for the movie Reversal of Fortune. For Disney fans, he was the voice of Scar in the animated movie Lion King. And for superhero movie die-hards, he played Alfred to Ben Affleck’s Batman in the DC movies.
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