Jurassic World Finds Its Villain In Vincent D’Onofrio
It’s irresponsible to create a big tentpole potential blockbuster without giving audiences a villain that is just as big a troublemaker as the film itself. When it comes to Colin Trevorrow’s highly anticipated sequel Jurassic World, one might have thought they’d skew young for the bad guy, considering the leads top out in their low 30s, but Legendary and Universal are going with someone far more established for their big villain, as they’ve hired on Vincent “Gomer Pyle” D’Onofrio for the part. Geez, he’s away from being a cop on Law & Order: Criminal Intent for two-and-a-half years and now he’s on the wrong side of the law. Remember your training!
For a second bit of casting news, Indian actor Irrfan Khan has also joined the film. Trevorrow, who wrote the film’s screenplay with his Safety Not Guaranteed co-writer Derek Connolly, is rather unsurprisingly keeping a tight lid on the sequel’s plotline and character notes, so we’re not quite sure what D’Onofrio will be doing, or how big the chair in his evil headquarters will be. I don’t want to go out on a limb here, but I”m guessing Khan will be playing a man of Indian descent, and probably a mathematician.
What we do know about Jurassic World comes from Chris Pratt, who will will be playing a guy who is both cynical like Ian Malcolm and in awe of biology like Alan Grant. Part of the film’s setting will be Costa Rica, where yet another attempt to get this theme park created is under way. But Pratt has assured fans that the plot choices are realistic and justifiable, so it shouldn’t just be your normal sequel schlock.
Which is good, because D’Onofrio has been in some pretty terrible movies over the years. But he often appears in a handful of flicks each year, so it all balances out. Last year, he was in Mikael Håfström’s action thriller Escape Plan — which also starred Sam Neill for all our “six degrees of Jurassic Park” players — Wayne Kramer’s crime drama Pawn Shop Chronicles, Fredrik bond’s action drama Charlie Countryman (with the unfamous Shia LaBeouf), and the road trip comedy Ass Backwards. And he’s got loads more in the pipeline, including David Dobkin’s murder drama The Judge with Robert Downey, Jr., Jaume Collet-Serra’s Run All Night with Liam Neeson and Jeff and Michael Zimbalist’s upcoming biopic Pelé .
Khan, who had a breakout year in 2012 with roles in Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man and Ang Lee’s Life of Pi, has been starring in popular Indian films such as Ritesh Batra’s romantic drama The Lunchbox and Nikhil Advani’s thriller D-Day.
I think you’ll all remember one of D’Onofrio’s buggified last trips into sci-fi, which you can watch below.
