A Harry Potter Star Just Joined Norman Reedus’ Walking Dead Spin-Off
Actress Clémence Poésy of the Harry Potter films has joined the cast of AMC's The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, alongside Norman Reedus.
With The Walking Dead in its home stretch of final episodes, attention is turning to the future of the Dead franchise, particularly to the Daryl Dixon spinoff headed by Norman Reedus. According to an exclusive report by Deadline, French actress Clémence Poésy (The Harry Potter film series) has joined the cast. She will play the female lead Isabelle, who is a member of a religious group who joins Daryl (Reedus) as they travel across France.
In her journey across France, Isabelle will be forced to confront her dark past in the City of Lights, Paris. It still isn’t clear how Daryl gets across the ocean to France to set up The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon (the series’ official title), and we’re assuming it will be addressed somehow in these final episodes. While fans celebrated the spinoff’s announcement, they were also upset that it seemingly spoiled the fact that Norman Reedus’ Daryl will survive the series, known for its shocking deaths of lead characters.
Clémence Poésy appeared in both parts of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire as Fleur Delacour, a witch who married Ron Weasley’s brother. Poésy just appeared in the Apple TV+ series The Essex Serpent as Stella Ransome. The 40-year-old actress had previously appeared in Gossip Girl and In Bruges.
The report also states that actor Adam Nagaitis has joined the cast as a character named Quinn, a former British citizen now making a good living off of the Paris black market as owner of Demimonde, which is described by AMC as a “sexy underground nightclub.” Nagaitis recently starred in the HBO hit event series Chernobyl as Vasily Ignatenko, and had previously appeared in the first season of AMC’s The Terror as Cornelius Hickey, a member of a British sailing crew in the mid-1850s that is stranded in the Arctic with a creature that stalks and kills them.
The Walking Dead spinoff, created by Angela Kang, just started shooting on-location in France just before Halloween, with Norman Reedus filming scenes in anticipation of the series premiere next year, which doesn’t yet have a date.
The series, though initially highly anticipated by fans, has seen some upheaval this year, and has undergone major changes, led by the April departure of actress Melissa McBride over what was described as logistical issues involving McBride having to relocate to Europe for filming. However, other reports indicate the split from the series was over creative issues.
Daryl isn’t the only Walking Dead character getting a spinoff. Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Negan) and Lauren Cohan (Maggie) will star in The Walking Dead: Dead City, which will see the unlikely pair fighting zombies in Manhattan for a six-episode mini-series. That mini-series is eyeing an April 2023 premiere, as it is currently filming in New Jersey.
The spinoffs come as Fear the Walking Dead, the very first Walking Dead spinoff, eyes a return in 2023 for its eighth season. The Walking Dead: The World Beyond finished its two-season run last year, and an anthology series, Tales of the Walking Dead, finished a six episode run this summer.
Perhaps even more anticipated than Norman Reedus’ spinoff is yet another series, this one reuniting Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira as they reprise the roles of Rick Grimes and Michonne. The pair were initially supposed to star in two movies, but those were revamped to a mini-series instead.
Reedus has another AMC series, Ride With Norman Reedus (based on his love of biking), and is also set to star in The Bikeriders, an outlaw biker film.
The final episode of The Walking Dead airs on November 20.
