David Thewlis and Damon Herriman can’t contain their enthusiasm for The Artful Dodger. The duo costar alongside Thomas Brodie-Sangster (The Queen’s Gambit, The Maze Runner) in Hulu’s breathtakingly fun Charles Dickens tale, which catapults the Oliver Twist character Jack Dawkins/Dodger (Brodie-Sangster) into 1850s Australia, where he’s intent on being a top surgeon. If only he can clear his debts and fend off a rag-tag team of sinister fellas out to get him.

Created by James McNamara, David Maher, and David Taylor, the series also stars Maia Mitchell (Good Trouble), Damien Garvey (Harrow), Lucy-Rose Leonard, Robert McFarlane, Tim Minchin (Upright), and a bevy of other stars. Bound to be one of the finest offerings Hulu delivers this year, The Artful Dodger moves at a breezy pace in its elaborate 19th century setting. David Thewlis and Damon Herriman opened up about taking on their roles and much more in this exclusive MovieWeb interview, and you can watch our video with them above.

David Thewlis Takes on Fagin
The Artful Dodger Release Date November 29, 2023 Cast Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Maia Mitchell, David Thewlis, Damon Herriman, Damien Garvey Genres Drama, Comedy, Adventure Seasons 1

The legendary David Thewlis was seen recently in Big Mouth, Human Resources, and TV’s Fargo and Netflix’s Sandman. He gave one of the best performances in film history thanks to Mike Leigh’s Naked, and his role as Remus Lupin in the Harry Potter films captured great attention. In The Artful Dodger he delivers a fine turn playing Fagin, a father figure to Dodger, but their relationship is far from perfect. Fagin wants to help Dodger, but is their storied past too complicated?

“I never thought you could take the world of Charles Dickens and transpose it to Australia with such ease and wonderful possibilities,” Thewlis told MovieWeb. “Then to discover that actually it’s not out of the realm of possibility that these people would have ended up out here. I thought [that] was a wonderful comic device.”

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The interactions between Thewlis and a wonderful Thomas Brodie-Sangster deliver some of the finest scenes in the ambitious series, which wins points for its acting, writing, and production quality. The role of Fagin was enticing, as Thewlis pointed out:

This as a sympathetic character, a sort of very lovable rascal, and more about his relationship with Dodger in a paternal sense. It’s kind of this cheeky fun of carrying on his criminality and his fool-proof schemes to get money and scrape by.

David Herriman’s Take on Being a Villain
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Damon Herriman has been an audience favorite for some time with standout roles in Justified, Run Rabbit Run, and the series Mr. Inbetween. In this iteration of the DickensVerse, the actor plays Captain Gaines, a persistent detective who investigates Jack and Fagin for their crimes. Gaines may be passionate about his career but has no idea of his wife’s infidelity. Herriman explained:

“I think the most surprising thing for me was that I was going to get to work with David Thewlis, because I was such a fan of his before we started working on this. But also, just how great the scripts were and the scope of the stories that you could tell in this world. Even now, having watched it all and finished it, I’m like, ‘There’s so much more you can do with this.’ It’s such a great world that’s been created.”

Related: The Artful Dodger Review | The Reimagined Charles Dickens Story is Hulu’s Best New Series

The character of Captain Gaines figures prominently throughout the series, forcing Dodger to keep looking over his shoulder. When asked about working alongside Thomas Brody-Sangster, he said, “I loved working with Thomas and David. Honestly, the whole cast. One of the really impressive things about this job is when you’re going to work and looking around and seeing everybody be so brilliant, you think, ‘Am I the bad one in this?’ Because everybody is so good in this show.” Herriman continued:

“In terms of taking on that role… Captain Gaines is very much in the realm of the mustache-twirling villain, the classic kind of villain, [it was] just trying to find the humanity in him and make him feel like a real person. That’s the challenge with a character like that. It’s very easy for it to become a cartoon or a cardboard cutout. The challenge is always fighting that and trying to find a real person in it.”

Working on the Elaborate Set

David Thewlis also said he was immediately drawn in by Thomas Brody-Sangster. “The first time he ever opened his mouth to play Jack, he was just fantastic. So, I knew that I was in very, very good hands, because I’d already acted with him before we arrived here in Australia. He’s just one of those actors where you look in their eyes and once they shout action, you don’t see Thomas. Hopefully he doesn’t see David, and he just became Jack, and I’m Fagin.

Related: Best Charles Dickens Movie Adaptations, Ranked

“That’s always the best you can hope for,” he added. “So, for those moments where the camera is rolling, you’re really believing it. That’s when the best acting happens, I think. And that’s completely true of Thomas, because he transformed. In those moments—the two of us—I felt what Fagin feels for him. I felt very warm and affectionate for him. And it was remarkably easy. He’s just very good.”

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In the meantime, the actors credit the production crew, who erected an entire medical outpost in a warehouse, and much more, to create a realistic look and feel of 19th century Australia. “It was impressive being on those sets,” Damon Herriman went on to say, adding:

“The hospital set, for example, [was] on the top floor of a warehouse in Sydney. You could walk from room to room. It’s not one of those things where one door ends, and you pretend that you’re walking into the next room. You really were walking into the next room. They did a similar thing with the outdoor stuff as well. So, in terms of feeling like you were in the period, it really helped.”

“There was no pretense, like you say,” Thewlis added. “In a technical way, you’ll see we were able to go upstairs, downstairs, and through about three or four rooms within the hospital. The exteriors were more or less like a small town that was built, and you would get lost in it. And bugs in the bush. I didn’t like that. But everyone got on very well. We all had a very good time, and there were just so many beautiful people around. I think that’s partly why the show works. You can see that. That humor and warmth bubbles through to the camera and hopefully to people’s homes.”

The Artful Dodger is streaming on Hulu. You can find the link below:

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