The Boys actor Antony Starr is often suggested as the ideal person to play Resident Evil bad guy Wesker in a future adaptation of Capcom’s horror video game. A lot of that has to do with his incredible performance as blonde haired supervillain Homelander. And Starr recently got fans excited when, at a convention, he responded to a fan who said he’d be a great Wesker by saying he wanted the role.
But just how serious is he about playing Wesker? Speaking to Comicbook.com ahead of the fifth and final season of The Boys, Starr downplayed his interest, insisting he was simply offering a stock answer when asked about Wesker at the convention.
“I don’t even know what it is, man,” Starr said of the Wesker role. “I’m an actor from New Zealand, and if people offer you a job you go yeah, cuz there’s not many jobs in New Zealand. So I’m trained into thinking like, if someone said, do you want that? Yeah. I want that! What is it?”
However, Starr did admit that he’s getting more and more fan requests to play Wesker. But he thinks, at age 50, he’s too old to play the villain, and that the only reason people think he should play Wesker in the first place is because of Homelander’s blonde hair.
“So people keep bringing this up,” he said. “The only thing I have in common with that is blonde hair, which I’ve gotten rid of as you can see. I think you probably need someone younger. I’m 50.”
As some fans have already pointed out, Starr being 50 probably wouldn’t make him too old to play Wesker (most think just reprising his Homelander look would be perfect for the role). Indeed, The Boys co-star Jensen Ackles, who plays Soldier Boy, insisted Starr was “perfect” for the role, adding: “That would be amazing. I would watch it.”
Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil reboot movie, out later this year, does not feature any characters from the video games. Speaking about the project last year, Cregger himself said his movie would be “obedient to the lore of the games,” but also a different story from anything shown in Capcom’s franchise previously. “I’m not going to tell Leon’s story, because Leon’s story is told in the games,” he said. “[Fans] already have that.”
So if Starr really did want to put his name down as Wesker, he’d probably have to wait for a different take from a different director. So what’s next for Starr? He’s trading in his cape for a white-haired wig and spectacles to play artist Andy Warhol in Samo Lives, a biopic about Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].
