William Jackson Harper has tapped into a very specific source of serendipity. When the actor was first auditioning for NBCs The Good Place—which had already locked Kristen Bell and Ted Danson as its leads—a friend recommended rewatching Dansons old show, Cheers. Harper did—and in the middle of watching the second episode, he got a call confirming that he had landed the role of anxious philosopher Chidi.
Nearly the same thing happened with Midsommar, Hereditary director Ari Asters beautiful, unsettling sophomore feature. In the film, Harper plays Josh, an anthropology student researching a tucked-away Swedish cults mid-summer festival. Harper, a massive horror fan, decided to watch Hereditary after receiving the script for Midsommar: ”I was like, Oh wow, this is great. I really want this. Im definitely not getting it because of how bad I want it,” he said. But that same day, Harper got an audition appointment for the film. The actor doesnt know how or why this keeps happening, but he would like the universe to keep his good fortune going.
In a recent interview with Vanity Fair, Harper spoke candidly about his surreal luck, the intense filming process for Midsommar, and what it was like to be one of the few black people in Budapest, where the movie was shot.
Vanity Fair: Are you generally a horror-movie person?
William Jackson Harper: I love horror. I dont watch it all the time, because I think if I did it would probably start to affect my mental health, but I love a good scare. I loved the original Wicker Man; I think its one of my favorite movies of all time. Rosemarys Baby. And obviously Hereditary, which I think is one of the best movies ever made.
Did you always want to play Josh, or did you have your eye on any other roles?
I was auditioning for Josh. I just got the script, saw my character, and I was like, Oh this guy actually has some interesting stuff to do. [Ari and I] talked about Joshs personal journey to this obsession with Northern European pagan traditions. I feel like theres such a focus on non-European groups that had not been touched by society [in anthropology]. Thats sort of the obsession. And for Josh, I was thinking about how interesting would it be to find complete societies in a very, very Western country. Where could you find those people that are holding on to these older ideas that had all but disappeared from Western society and religion?
Im glad you delved into the backstory behind that, because as a black viewer, I was internally screaming at Josh a lot.
[Laughs] Yeah, that wRead More – Source
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