Mike Flanagan's Roderick Usher Needed To Be Bruce Greenwood

By Jen Maravegias | TV | October 25, 2023 |

By Jen Maravegias | TV | October 25, 2023 |

If you’ve already watched Mike Flanagan’s The Fall Of The House Of Usher on Netflix, it might surprise you to learn that Bruce Greenwood was not the first choice to play Roderick Usher. The role originally went to Frank Langella. He famously played the very sexy Count in the 1979 film version of Dracula, a very unsexy Richard Nixon in 2008’s Frost/Nixon, and Skeletor in 1987’s Masters of the Universe. Truly, a storied film career.

Langella was fired from Usher midway through filming the season amid allegations of on-set misconduct. It was a good decision for a number of reasons, the least of which is that it gave us the gift of Bruce Greenwood’s outstanding performance as the patriarch of the disintegrating Usher family.

Greenwood has had a journeyman’s career in Hollywood, kicking around since he was in The Beachcombers series, which aired in the mid-’70s. He played Dr. Seth Griffin in St. Elsewhere, Pierce Lawton on Knots Landing, and memorably played Ashley Judd’s conniving husband in Double Jeopardy.

The Fall of the House of Usher isn’t his first Flanagan production either. He’s the titular character in 2017’s Gerald’s Game, and you can catch him in Doctor Sleep as well. The man has 149 acting credits listed on IMDb.com. He’s been around is what I’m saying.

But Roderick Usher is a career-defining role for Greenwood. It could have easily been a one-note performance as a mad titan of industry in a panic over the sudden and “inexplicable” loss of an empire. But Greenwood’s expressive face and ability to turn on a dime from a doting grandfather to a contemptible villain give Usher the kind of depth Poe probably dreamed about for this self-insert character. Roderick Usher is the type of father who uses his calmest voice to say the most horrific things. He exudes the confidence and charm of a rich, white guy who knows that he’ll never face any sort of consequences. But, at the same time, has to contend with the cognitive impairment that’s destroying what had been his once formidable mind.

That disease, CADASIL, also begs the question as to whether or not the horrors that Roderick Usher experiences are the actual spirits of his violently departed children or the hallucinations of a brain collapsing in on itself under the weight of disease and guilt. And there’s definitely a tinge of guilt to Roderick Usher. Otherwise, he would not have invited Auguste Dupin (Carl Lumbly) to hear his confession. That framework, which is also the basis of Poe’s short story, allows Flanagan and Greenwood the space to create a more nuanced performance than I think Frank Langella would have been capable of.

In addition to all of that, Greenwood brings a charismatic Silver Fox quality to Roderick Usher that allows the viewer to be drawn into his and Madeline’s web of dysfunction that Langella does not possess. In the original story, Usher is described as having “cadaverousness of complexion.” With “a finely molded chin, speaking in its want of prominence, of a want of moral energy,” and as having an “excessive nervous agitation.” The narrator has great pity for his friend and wants the reader to pity him as well. But Flangan’s Usher is an entirely different animal who doesn’t ask for our pity. He’s a contemptibly selfish asshole who is in the “Find Out” phase of his own machinations. When he made his deal for fame and fortune, he did not expect to be brought low. He did not anticipate being made to witness the dissolution of his family and his wealth and he’s caught entirely off guard by everything that is happening to him.

Finally, say what you will about Mike Flanagan’s “weakness” for monologuing, for the most part I enjoy them. I like to think of them as a gift to actors and auditioners everywhere. In The Fall of the House of Usher, Greenwood made a meal out of the “lemonade out of lemons” monologue in episode three. His matter-of-fact delivery makes the speech something you can hear Raymond Sackler, or David Ricks (Chair & CEO of Eli Lilly) saying. I’m still thinking about it.