As you know from the books, Cormoran Strike is a war veteran who lost half of his right leg in Afghanistan when a vehicle called a Viking that he was riding in blew up from an IED in the road. His leg is missing from the knee down, and he often wears a prosthesis or, when his knee is particularly painful, he uses crutches.
Filming for the BBC and HBO television adaptation began in November 2016 and wrapped on 5 April 2017. Tom Burke is playing the lead role, but he has two whole legs….
According to a crew member I met in Masham back in January, for close-up shots of Strike’s missing limb, they’re using a body double who is a real amputee and was on set quite frequently. Apparently the double looks nothing like Tom Burke and has a full-grown bushy beard.
For most of the time, Tom will probably be wearing full-length trousers and will be acting with a limp in his stride, as though he is wearing his prosthesis. He worked with a movement director in order to get his limp to look genuin.
Thank you for this update. I know the second book “Silkworm” has the one time (I think) he was using crutches and it mentions that he had the right pants leg pinned up. Since the amputee double looks nothing like Tom, and it would show him walking, I wonder if that was a time they had to come up with CGI or something.
Although, I do remember Cormoran (in the one of the books–not sure which oneI) mentioning using a “stick” but I thought when he did that he was referring to a cane. Unless “stick” is a slang term for crutches?
I’m really hoping they made a behind-the-scenes feature to go with the show–there’s certainly enough interesting aspects of the show to make one worth watching!
Thanks for your comments! Yes, Cormoran uses crutches at one point in The Silkworm, and he uses the stick (a cane that he purchases at Boots chemist) in The Cuckoo’s Calling. A BTS feature to go with the show would be great!