Comic fans get a bird’s-eye view of Gotham, as an utterly transformed Colin Farrell shows us the bloody rise of one of Batman’s most iconic foes
When Matt Reeves was in the process of directing 2022’s The Batman, he had the idea to continue expanding the world of Gotham via an origin story, but one that didn’t focus on the dark crusader we’ve all come to know so well throughout copious remakes. Instead, Reeves wanted to focus on a character from the Dark Knight’s vaunted Rogues’ Gallery. “In the comics, those characters are inspired by the presence of Batman,” says Reeves. “[Film producer] Dylan Clark and I were very excited about the idea of doing an HBO-style show that could not be focused on Batman, but instead be focused on one of those Rogues’ Gallery characters and see them coming into being.”
The Penguin, an eight-episode limited series, focuses on Oswald “Oz” Cobb, the disfigured former lieutenant of crime boss Carmine Falcone, who is derisively nicknamed “Penguin” by his fellow mafiosos. “I pitched the idea that, in the wake of Carmine Falcone’s assassination, there was a power vacuum in Gotham, and the version of Oz that’s in our movie is a mid-level version of the Penguin. He is mocked and underestimated, but he has a deep, deep ambition, a dark American Dream building within him,” says Reeves.
The series takes place a week after The Batman. In that moment of uncertainty following Carmine’s death, Oz is making moves. It’s written and run by Lauren LeFranc, who says she did not struggle one bit in building out the world of Gotham without Batman. “The goal is, and my hope is, that if you have interesting enough characters — complicated enough, quirky, off-kilter people that you want to engage with — you’re not thinking about who else I wish could be in this world with us,” she says.
Starring as the Penguin is an unrecognizable Colin Farrell, who reprises his brief role from The Batman. When first faced with the character, whose exterior was created by prosthetics and makeup designer Mike Marino, Farrell was uncertain about his undertaking. “When I read the script first for The Batman, I was kind of a bit baffled as to what I could do with it,” the Oscar nominee admits. “I looked at this creation, and I was confused by it. But also, it spoke to me so clearly. It spoke with a sense of history, a sense of threat, a sense of violence. There was kind of something sorrowful to the visage as well. It was just so complex.”
After the introduction of the character in Reeves’ feature film, the scripts from LeFranc further demonstrated to Farrell how his burgeoning supervillain existed in concert with so many others. “They created this whole world of complex characters,” he says. “It’s not just the Oz show. It’s all these human beings that are so complex and multifaceted, and I just knew that we were going to get to look into the engine of this guy, personally, in an interesting way.”
Indeed, the series digs into Oz’s relationship with his mother Francis, played by Deirdre O’Connell and Carmine’s daughter Sofia Falcone, played by Cristin Milioti, both whom suffer from their own mental and emotional challenges. For Milioti, probing the depths of her criminally insane, tragically misunderstood character has been a professional highlight. “This is the type of role that is an incredible dream to play because there’s so much that happens to her,” the actress reflects. “I would read each script and pinch myself when I would realize what I was going to get to do.”
The series not only explores Sofia’s origin story in a flashback episode, it looks at Oz’s relationship with his mother, who suffers from early-onset dementia. “I wanted to make sure that in this rise to power story, there was something greater behind that,” says LeFranc. “I don’t think people seek power just to seek power. So, I thought about this idea that Oz wants to make his mother proud, and he needs her love and affection, and she’s withholding. Why is she withholding? That’s something that we reveal deeper in the season. “I wanted a woman with energy that felt like Oz exists because of her, that he is who he is firmly because of her.”
For better or worse, the actors that surrounded Farrell — whose physical transformation was usually completed by the time the others came in — only got to meet the charming Irishman after the show was over. But for Farrell, being able to disappear into his disguise was liberating. “The distance between myself and that character is so profound because of the makeup. It’s like I’m looking out to the world in a different way,” he says. “When we put the makeup on first, it was instantaneous. I mean, I had been thinking about the script and had conversations with Matt about the psychology of Oz, but when the makeup went on, it was like those YouTube videos where you see a cat seeing themselves in the mirror for the first time and they recoil. Looking back at your reflection, and it’s not what you have seen for 45 years, it’s really, really powerful. I just gave myself over to that.”
The Penguin airs Sunday, November 3, on HBO Canada