One local actor is about to give us all nightmares. Paul T. Taylor, who has appeared on stages all over Dallas-Fort Worth, along with a handful of movies and TV shows, has been cast as Pinhead in the upcoming movie Hellraiser: Judgment.
The 10th installment in the gory film franchise, created by horror master Clive Barker, was announced suddenly in mid-February. The news came this past weekend via Bloody Disgusting that Taylor was taking over the lead role.
Taylor is a classically trained actor who has racked up accolades in everything from Mr. Burns: A Post-electric Play at Fort Worth's Stage West to The Hot Mikado at Dallas' Theatre Three to Miracle on 34th Street at Dallas Children's Theater.
Now he's donning the movie monster's acupuncture-gone-wrong look after the previous Pinhead from 2011's Hellraiser: Revelations, Stephan Smith Collins, declined to reprise his role. Doug Bradley played the role in the first eight films.
Director Gary Tunnicliffe previously teased the casting of a new Pinhead with a post identifying the actor as “a classically trained stage and film actor who brings a great physical presence and more than a hint of Peter Cushing and Ralph Fiennes.”
Anyone who saw Taylor as the titular and terrifying Mr. Burns at Stage West will have no problem imagining him as the villain.
Taylor and Caroline Dubberly in Mr. Burns, A Post-electric Play at Stage West.
Photo courtesy of Stage West
Taylor and Caroline Dubberly in Mr. Burns, A Post-electric Play at Stage West.
Since his career as a feature film director started in 1998, Darren Aronofsky has been known for making intense dramas with stories that are often intentionally hard to understand, like The Whaleand mother!. To put it plainly, he’s never been a filmmaker who’s been beholden to genres, so the idea of him making a straightforward crime film like the new Caught Stealing is baffling for those who have followed his career.
The story centers on Hank Thompson (Austin Butler), who once had big dreams of being a professional baseball player, but now tends bar at a seedy New York City joint. Hank, along with his girlfriend Yvonne (Zoë Kravitz), is unwittingly dragged into a criminal enterprise when his next door neighbor, Russ (Matt Smith), asks Hank to watch his cat when he goes out of town.
Multiple goons soon start showing up at Russ’ door, looking for money that Russ has taken from them. Despite not knowing anything about that, Hank gets beaten up, threatened, and pursued by groups led by Colorado (Bad Bunny) and Hasidic Jews Lipa (Liev Schreiber) and Shmully (Vincent D’Onofrio), as well as Detective Roman (Regina King).
Written by Charlie Huston (adapting his own 2004 book of the same name), the film is inarguably the most entertaining one of Aronofsky’s career. Although there are multiple soul-crushing events for Hank in the film, Aronofsky seems to rein in his more depressing tendencies in favor of a fast-paced crime thriller. There are plenty of moments where he could have leaned into the darker parts of the story, but instead he lets the comedy of Huston’s script shine through, keeping things relatively light.
The characters are what make the movie work the most. Hank’s backstory lends extra meaning to his current dilemma, and also underscores his relationships with Yvonne and his unseen mother, whom he calls every day. Every one of the criminals - from Russ to two Russian thugs to the Orthodox Jews - stands out in a way that serves the story and enhances the entertainment factor. Even small roles like Hank’s boss Paul (Griffin Dunne) make an impact thanks to the way the film is structured.
It’s also nice to see Butler let loose after a string of award-bait roles in films like Elvis and The Bikeriders. Hank fights through a significant amount of trauma, allowing Butler to show off his dramatic acting skills again, but he also gets to indulge in a bit of action acting, which he handles with aplomb. Butler has been impressive before, but he makes Hank into a magnetic character throughout here.
The other actors are a little bit of a mixed bag. Kravitz is good, but she doesn’t get enough screentime for her character to feel fully realized. Schreiber, D’Onofrio, and Bad Bunny are a hoot in their respective roles, each bringing a menace that’s tinged with likability. King tries to employ a New York accent, something that distracts from what her character is saying.
Nothing in Aronofsky’s previous filmography suggested he would be interested in a movie like Caught Stealing, much less be so successful actually making it. But movie fans are the winners for his mid-career change of heart, getting a highly enjoyable crime film that delivers on both the story and acting front.
