‘That was my only hang-up’: Dopesick creator reveals Will Poulter almost didn’t get cast because he ‘looks too young’

Will stars as Purdue rep Billy in Dopesick (Picture: Disney Plus)

Dopesick creator Danny Strong has revealed he almost didn’t cast Will Poulter in the upcoming Disney Plus thriller because he looked too young.

Starring Michael Keaton, Dopesick tells the story of the American opioids crisis in the 1990s, particularly uncovering the activities of Purdue Pharma, which was responsible for the manufacturing of OxyContin – an addictive prescription painkiller.

One of the biggest names attached to the series is Will, who plays Purdue rep Billy, who also becomes hooked on the power of the drug as he rises up the ranks of Purdue Pharma by pushing the drug onto doctors to prescribe to their patients.

But despite Will being incredibly impressive in the part, showrunner Danny had a minor reservation about casting him for the role.

Speaking to Metro.co.uk, Danny said of Will’s performance: ‘He’s wonderful in the part, such a great guy too, so Will is someone that I was a fan of before this.

‘I saw the movie Detroit, which he’s the villain in and there’s a there’s almost an hour-long section of the film, it’s almost like a one-man show, where he just drives the story for an hour.

Will at the premiere of Dopesick last month (Picture: Getty)

‘I was so blown away by him that I thought he was going to get an Oscar nomination, and I went online immediately thinking, “Who is this guy? I’ve never seen him before.”’

When Danny realised Will also played ‘the doofus from We Are The Millers’ he realised he had a massive talent on his hands, dubbing him the ‘next Daniel Day Lewis or Christian Bale’.

However, he admitted: ‘My only concern with him in the part was that he might be too young, because my visual of him is younger and so I had a meeting with him because his agents said, “No, no, no, wait just, you know, meet with him and you’ll see.”’

Luckily, the meeting between Danny and Will went better than he could have hoped, adding: ‘It completely worked. I could tell from the meeting that I bought him as late-20s.

‘So I offered him the part in the meeting, which was always fun to do because it was literally just a meeting to look at him to see if he if he looked old enough and he did!’

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Hilariously, Will also seemed to be aware of the slight reservation from Danny’s side, with the creator adding of the star: ‘He told me later, “I tried on different shirts to make sure I looked older,” because he knew that was my literal only hang-up about it, for the part.’

The cast is full of other impressive names too, including Michael, Rosario Dawson, Peter Skarsgaard and Kaitlyn Dever.

Dopesick is released on Disney + on November 12.

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