Fan-Favorite Scream Star in Talks to Join Reboot of Stephen King’s Carrie (But Who Will They Play?)

Actor Matthew Lillard is in talks to join the cast of the upcoming Carrie remake at Prime Video, but there are a lot of questions hanging over this plan. Amazon is adapting the classic Stephen King novel Carrie all over again, but this time as a series instead of a movie. It seems like a good fit for Lillard, who has a lot of credits in the horror genre and will even return to the Scream franchise in the next installment. Deadline reported on Lillard’s connection to Carrie on Thursday, but it’s not clear who he will play. With the story extending out into a streaming series, he may be playing a character we don’t know yet at all.

Prime Video’s Carrie comes from Mike Flanagan, who will serve as showrunner and a writer on the series. It will star Summer H. Howell as the titular heroine Carrie, and Siena Agudong as Sue Snell, the closest thing to a friend Carrie has in the story. Lillard is the third cast member to be reported on, though he has not been confirmed like the other two. Looking at King’s original novel, the most likely character for Lillard to play seems to be the principal of the high school, as the story is generally lacking in adult men.

The principal might get enough screentime to warrant casting a beloved actor like Lillard, but if so, his part in the story is probably expanded quite a bit. Carrie is not a long novel — the original printing was 199 pages long — and the previous movie adaptations have been relatively faithful the book. The story may be stretched a bit to fill a series, or it may be adapted in finer detail. Alternatively, the show could extend beyond the ending of the book, as the 2002 adaptation attempted to do.

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Lillard just recently worked with Flanagan on another King adaptation — The Life of Chuck, which is slated for release in the U.S. on June 6th. It got positive feedback after its debut at the Toronto Film Festival last year, eve winning the People’s Choice Award there. Flanagan has done several King adaptations recently with great results, including Doctor Sleep and Gerald’s Game. He has also had success with other horror productions that clearly borrow from King’s style.

Whatever the plan is, the Carrie series is in the early stages right now, and there’s no word on when we might see it for ourselves. Lillard’s involvement has not been confirmed, so Howell and Agudong are the only confirmed cast members at the time. You can stream the 1976 and 2013 film adaptations of Carrie both on Max at the time of this writing, and King’s novel is available in print, digital, and audiobook formats.