Given that he played for his college team at Florida State University, you'd think Tyriq Withers' football background would've been a big reason he was cast in new sports horror HIM. According to director Justin Tipping, though, it was actually an old Instagram post of the actor's that proved to him he was the perfect person to play unwitting protagonist Cameron Cade.
"It was after his episode of Atlanta, which I saw, and I was like, 'Great', but I was actually scrolling his Instagram and I saw this clip... He was giving a speech to the cast and crew of that episode and he was so different to the character he played," Tipping, who co-wrote the new flick with Skip Bronkie and Zack Akers. "He's so soulful and, like, sensitive. So he's speaking to his gratitude and this and that, and thanking everyone and he was commanding the room. He just had that, that swagger that someone that grew up in locker rooms has. It was like he was talking to other players and hyping them up, and you can't really teach that. It's just baked into who he is."
Before appearing in Atlanta (season 3's 'Rich Wigga, Poor Wigga'), Withers had small roles and glorified cameos in the likes of Vampire Diaries spin-off Legacies and The Game. Following his supporting role in I Know What You Did Last Summer earlier this year, HIM marks his first leading role on the big screen, which was another selling point for Tipping.
"In a way, it was good that he hadn't been discovered yet or had been number one on a call sheet because he had an innocence to lose. I knew that if you took his groundedness and his naivete and put him in a world surrounded by people and strong personalities like Marlon Wayans and Julia Fox and Jim Jefferies, he would naturally be a fish out of water. It was just analogous to what he was going through in real life, with what was happening with the character, and all things just started aligning."
Produced by genre fan fave Jordan Peele, HIM opens on Cam as a kid, watching clips of the San Antonio Saviors' legendary quarterback Isaiah White (a never-better Marlon Wayans) with his football-obsessed father. Later, we catch up with grown Cam, now a gifted player who's caught the attention of the NFL, as he prepares for drafting season. That is, until a random, brutal attack one evening threatens his chances at making it to the big leagues...
Cam's spirits lift when he's reached out to by his idol, White, and invited to come train at his isolated compound in the desert. If he impresses the champ, he'll put in a good word with his superiors. Before long, though, Isaiah's sinister side starts to rear its ugly head – and his insecurities threaten to turn Cam's dream deal into a nightmare.
"When I was doing my character analysis, [I realized] there was a lot of quiet emotion, quiet grief, quiet vulnerability going on," Withers explains. "I think, coming from my own personal experience with sports, when coaches would yell at me – and I've had coaches put their hands on me – you go into this reserved place of, just, [having] this anger that you can't show or it will be a sign of weakness. I just applied that foundation to this movie, but also I think it's more relatable. I allow the audience to place their own emotions onto my character. And when you have somebody like Marlon, who's so creative with what he's throwing at you, I think all that was my initial reaction to what he was doing. It made it more interesting, subverting his chaos."
HIM releases is out now in the US, and releases in UK cinemas on October 3. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting upcoming horror movies.
