South Africans’ Thuso Mbedu breaks into Hollywood
The cast of the adaptation of Barry Jenkins to the bestselling novel ‘The Underground Railroad’ by Colson Whitehead is beginning to come together. In this upcoming Amazon series, Thuso Mbedu, Aaron Pierre and Chase W. Dillon are set to play Cora, Caesar and Homer respectively.
A South African native, Mbedu starred in shows which include Liberty, Shuga and Is’thunzi, for which she received two nominations for the International Emmy Award.
Pierre recently starred in another Amazon series, Brittania and appeared in an ITV miniseries called Prime Suspect 1973.
Dillon has a recurring role on BET’s First Wives Clubs and was cast as Young Igwe in Apple’s Little America.
A month after Amazon purchased the adaptation, Whitehead’s ‘The Underground Railroad’ won a Pulitzer Prize. The story is about young Cora, a slave on a Georgia cotton plantation. For all the slaves, life is miserable, but especially bad for Cora ; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she comes into womanhood— where even greater pain awaits her. They decide to take a terrifying risk and escape when Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad.
Also a 2016 National Book Award winner and Oprah Book Club pick was the book, which drew critical acclaim for its imaginative blend of history and magical fable – moving beyond the boundaries of realism in its depiction of a mythical underground train carrying slaves across an alternative America.
Source: Deadline
