The Amateur Star Caitriona Balfe Divulges New Details on Her Journey in Espionage

In the new spy-thriller The Amateur, the title reflects how the character played by Rami Malek is only tangentially connected to the dangerous world of espionage, though a deadly series of events requires him to hone entirely new skills. Luckily, Malek’s Charlie isn’t alone in his journey, as Caitríona Balfe plays Inquiline, a figure who uses a variety of skills to aid Charlie in his quest for revenge. While The Amateur is based on the Robert Littell book of the same name from 1981, Inquiline is absent from that source material, offering Balfe the unique opportunity to develop the all-new character. The Amateur is set to land in theaters on April 11th.

“Everything you need is in the script. Everything you need for the day to day, but for me, there was so much that I could fill in for myself that it was just great to be able to go off-piste and create that life for myself,” Balfe explained to ComicBook of developing Inquiline. “I’d spoken with Rami and I’d spoken with [director] James [Hawes] and making sure that nothing I was doing was going to contradict what they needed, but I was able to just really build her interior world and her history for myself in a way that I knew wouldn’t affect me in the most impactful way.”

The Amateur is described, “Charlie Heller (Malek) is a brilliant, but deeply introverted decoder for the CIA working out of a basement office at headquarters in Langley whose life is turned upside down when his wife is killed in a London terrorist attack. When his supervisors refuse to take action, he takes matters into his own hands, embarking on a dangerous trek across the globe to track down those responsible, his intelligence serving as the ultimate weapon for eluding his pursuers and achieving his revenge.”

Also starring in the movie are Rachel Brosnahan, Laurence Fishburne, Jon Bernthal, Michael Stuhlbarg, Holt McCallany, Julianne Nicholson, Adrian Martinez, and Danny Sapani, and was directed by James Hawes.

Going along with the idea of invention, even the character name “Inquiline” is inspired by animals who infiltrate the nests, dens, or burrows of other animals to then claim as their own. Of how her name inspired her performance, Balfe pointed out, “It’s little nuggets like that, it’s always good to feed those into your character, but I also think you want to build a person that feels very real and I think, for me, it was more about her interior world. She was such a … to be a lone wolf in that way, to also have retreated from the world in so many ways, but yet also be doing this thing that is so influential and and trying to expose these terrible instances of corruption and speaking truth to power in that way, it was such a wonderful contradiction. You try to take whatever you can, but most of the work is done quietly, filling in those blanks for yourself.”

The Amateur lands in theaters on April 11th.