Harry Melling, who played Dudley Dursley in the Harry Potter films, has been tapped to play a lead role in Scott Cooper's "The Pale Blue Eye". He is the latest addition to an all-star cast that includes Christian Bale (Batman Begins, Vice).
This marks the latest in a series of big breaks for Melling. Over the past few years, he has appeared in The Ballad of Buster Scruggs opposite Liam Neeson, The Devil All the Time with Robert Pattinson and Tom Holland, and The Queen's Gambit with Anya Taylor-Joy. Later in 2021, he will be seen in The Tragedy of Macbeth with Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand.
In Cooper's new movie, the zesty young actor will take on the part of famous author Edgar Allan Poe. The story follows a grizzled detective (Bale) in the 1830s as he tries to solve a series of murders at the West Point U.S. Military Academy. Melling's Poe, still young at the time, will serve as an assistant to Bale's character as they investigate the depths of human depravity. Bale, who plays Gorr the God-Butcher in the upcoming Thor: Love and Thunder, has worked with Cooper before on his films Out of the Furnace and Hostiles, but this will be Melling's first collaboration with the director.
The script is an adaptation of the Louis Bayard novel of the same name, which Cooper has apparently been trying to bring to the big screen for over a decade. A release date has not yet been announced.
