Andy Serkis is a wearer of many hats. The multi-time Screen Actors Guild award winner made a name for himself in the Lord of the Rings franchise, performing the motion capture work for Gollum. Serkis’s mo-cap talents took him to iconic IP such as King Kong and Planet of the Apes, but that’s not to say that Middlesex native has had a shortage of acclaimed live-action performances. Serkis showed face in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Ulysses Klaue and recently suited up as Alfred Pennyworth in the ever-expanding world of The Batman. On top of all of those acting credits, Serkis has brought his decades of filmmaking experience to behind the camera as well.
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Serkis’s first directorial endeavor was 2017’s Breathe, a biographical drama about Robin Cavendish and his struggles with polio. That project was a festival darling, making its biggest pop culture splashes at film fairs throughout 2017. His next two filmmaking credits would up both the budget and the action quite a bit, as Serkis helmed Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle and Venom: Let There Be Carnage in 2018 and 2021, respectively.
Speaking with ComicBook.com’s Liam Crowley at the Luther: The Fallen Sun premiere, Serkis admitted that while he “gets excited” by the larger franchises, his focus is currently on telling “individual and unique stories.”
“I’ve got a whole slate of films that I’ve been developing over the years,” Serkis said. “Very individual and unique stories that deserve telling and I’m very excited to tell. I also get excited by the big canvas and blockbusters and all the rest of it, but having been recently through the Venom experience, I’m concentrating more on the smaller films that have no less value, but speak in a different way.”
The next project on Serkis’s directorial slate is Animal Farm, a British animated drama that adapts the events from George Orwell’s novella of the same name. Serkis’s commitments with Animal Farm are why he was unable to return for Venom 3.
“I’ve got so many projects that I was just about to [work on], like Animal Farm for instance. We were just about to go into production with that, and then we delayed as Venom came up,” Serkis said in November 2022. “I really have to be very on top of the ones that I’ve been building to do for such a long time.”
Serkis can be seen as David Robey in Luther: The Fallen Sun, now streaming on Netflix.
