Vampire Adaptation THE PASSAGE Adds Mark-Paul Gosselaar
Fox Television has added several to the cast of The Passage, including Mark-Paul Gosselaar, according to several trade publications.
Gosselaar is just coming off the recently cancelled Pitch, also at Fox, and will star as FBI Agent Brad Wolgast, who is sent to retrieve a young girl from foster care. The girl, 10-year-old Amy (Saniyya Sidney), was the subject of Project Noah, a government experiment that went horribly wrong (as they do) and made the test subjects into fierce killing machines called “virals”. These virals used to be human, but are now monsters feeding off human blood.
Essentially, it’s a post-apocalyptic vampire story.
The story is told in two different timelines, with Amy being rescued at a survivors camp by Peter (B.J. Britt) and Alicia (Genesis Rodriguez), who take Amy in amid a world where the virals have overwhelmed the planet. Once they realize she’s got a unique ability to communicate with the virals, it becomes a quest story as they try to get Amy back to Colorado because she could hold the key to saving mankind.
Amy’s escape comes after Wolgast, on orders to take her to Project Noah, forms a bond with the girl and decides he can’t turn her over to secret government lab types. They almost make it to Canada when they’re caught. In the book, Wolgast’s fate isn’t too clear, unless you really really pay attention to the end.
Also in the book, Peter is the protagonist of the back half of the story, which picks up years after Wolgast’s part of the tale. So either the first half makes up the first season, or the producers are planning for multiple years. Because it’s not a simple story. (He’s also younger, but hey…)
Based on the trilogy by Justin Cronin (the first of which is reviewed here, and the last of which is reviewed here), the show got a pilot order in January, but was delayed and will now start shooting in Atlanta this month. Liz Heldens is writing the pilot, and Matt Reeves will executive produce along with Scott Free Productions’ Ridley Scott and David W. Zucker. Marcos Siega will direct the pilot and also executive produce.
