One of the stars of Invasion has recollected the horror that his castmates experienced when he was told to pretend to have a seizure in front of them before they realised that it wasn’t real.
Invasion, a new sci-fi series that’s launched on Apple TV Plus, depicts a mysterious alien invasion that occurs on Earth in the present day as seen from the perspectives of different characters across the world.
Starring actors among the likes of Sam Neill, Shamier Anderson, Golshifteh Farahani and Shioli Kutsuna, one of the individuals who has a peculiar connection to the invasion is shy English schoolboy Casper Morrow, played by International Emmy-winner Billy Barratt.
During a recent conversation with Metro.co.uk, the actor, who has also starred in series including Mr Selfridge and The Alienist, opened up about how he prepared for the role of Casper, who is bullied at school and suffers from epileptic seizures.
Billy explained that he had a ‘lovely lady’ on set who spoke with him and director Jakob Verbruggen ‘about seizures and how it all works and what you should do if you do have a seizure or know anyone that has seizures’.
‘We talked about it and then we did some practise and then I was kind of practising at home more than we practised on set,’ the 13-year-old said.
Billy recalled a time when he and the other young actors playing his classmates came together to ‘break the ice’, which is when Jakob – who is also an executive producer on the show – made an unconventional suggestion.
‘There was one time where we all got together and it was kind of just to break the ice, like we were bowling and all of this fun stuff, and the director Jakob, he came up to me and he said, “So I haven’t told anyone, but just have a seizure and see how they react.” And I was like, “Ok,”’ Billy said, imitating how surprised he was by Jakob’s prompt.
‘So we did it and I had one and then everyone kind of was like, “Oh my god, what’s going on? What’s happening?” And they came over and they were like, “Billy, you ok? You ok?” And I was like, “Yeah, yeah, I’m all good.”’
Eventually, Billy’s co-stars cottoned onto what he was doing, realising that he was ok and turning it into a group acting exercise.
‘They all got into character and everything, and yeah that’s kind of how we prepared for it I suppose,’ he said.
Almost straight away in the series, Casper and his peers find themselves slap bang in the middle of some action-packed scenes, as they have to fend for themselves while gradually learning what’s going on across the world.
Billy expressed how much he enjoys taking part in the ‘really fun’ high-octane sequences, saying: ‘I actually love doing my own stunts.’
The actor revealed that when trying to figure out how to play his character, he turned to music as his main source of inspiration.
‘What influenced my performance was actually music. Music really helps me get into character, helps me learn what that character’s like,’ he said, adding that he and Casper share similar music tastes, liking bands including Nirvana and Green Day.
Invasion is co-created by David Weil and Simon Kinberg, the latter of whom made his directorial debut for the 2019 X-Men film Dark Phoenix.
The series consists of 10 episodes, with the first three made available to watch in one go ahead of a weekly release.
Invasion is available to stream on Apple TV Plus.
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