The Last of Us is an award-winning video game considered by many to be one of the strongest story-driven games ever. The Last of Us follows Joel, a hardened smuggler, as he is tasked with protecting and bringing fourteen-year-old Ellie across a post-apocalyptic America. following a devastating fungal pandemic that wiped out most of the population. The Last of Us has garnered acclaim from critics and has expanded into a sequel game, comics, and now a television series.
Merle Dandridge has been a part of The Last of Us since it first debuted in 2013. She plays Marlene, leader of the Fireflies, a group of revolutionaries fighting against the oppressive military regime that took control after the outbreak. Marlene also shares a connection with Ellie. While Dandridge is not the only actor from the game involved in the series, she is the only one reprising her original role.
Screen Rant and several other media outlets spoke with Dandridge about reprising her role as Marlene from The Last of Us video game in the new HBO series. Dandridge shared how it feels to play this character for ten years across different mediums and talked about working with Pedro Pascal, Neil Druckmann, and Craig Mazin on The Last of Us.
Merle Dandridge On The Last Of Us
10 years ago, you get the call to voice a character in a video game. Did you ever for a second think you'd actually get to play that role in live-action? Tell us how it all went down?
Merle Dandridge: I know. I feel singularly lucky in this particular iteration that I get to see Marlene in four different forms. That over the course of the 10 years I feel as though I've got an opportunity to mature as an artist, mature into the role, and really get to know her on a deeper, more inherent level. But when I first got the call to audition for the game, I went in, and I auditioned opposite Troy Baker who was playing Joel. And Neil was the other person in the room.
I immediately felt like I found my tribe. I felt like, "Oh, these are my people. One, they get me. I get, this material is fantastic. I feel like there's so much to chew on." And I was right. 10 years later, there's still so much to chew on. When it even became a possibility that an HBO series was in the works, of course my spirit leaned toward, "Oh man, that would be really cool," but with very little expectation around it. When I did get the call from Neil and he said, "I'd like to offer you the role of Marlene for yet another time," it was an absolute astonishing delight.
Screen Rant: It has been 10 years since playing the role of Marlene. What surprised you the most about reprising your role in this new form for television?
Merle Dandridge: I think I was daily surprised because I had previously only lived in my imagination as far as the world was concerned. I had never tangibly been able to interact with the walls, feel the dankness of the room, feel the heaviness and despair of the environment, and see the wear and tear on everyone around me because of the extraordinary costuming and makeup design, the breakdown of the sets of the costumes of the characters, the wigs, everything was a sensory overload to my system for somebody who was already very vibrantly alive and connected and having all of my feelers out in this world anyway, to see them like that and to step into that world was wild.
And then having only been in the MoCap suit as Marlene, to step into those clothes and to move around in those boots, to carry the weapons. And, gosh, on the fly to be able to load those weapons, I was like, "This is not my strong suit, but it better be." All of those things that were not just blocks of wood, to practically take ownership of being a soldier and the leader of an army.
It was something that I was like, "Okay, take a deep breath, jump over this cliff, girl. Just do it. You know who she is, you know what she's about." The only thing is to get used to the practical bits. And so there was a little bit of messing with the clutch a little bit and stop and go. And then I was off to the races.
Talk to me a little bit about how Craig and Neil let you know the arc that you were going to be playing, and how much it deviates or it goes more in-depth than you expected from what you knew about her in the game.
Merle Dandridge: Mm-hmm. Well, one of the really fun aspects of jumping in the deep end with Craig Mazin was that I really could talk to him about every little bit of imagination or backstory, and he knew it. He understood it, and he got it, and was invested and interested in it. All of those little bits that have been the exciting effervescence in our creativity around these characters suddenly get the opportunity to be elucidated for the screen.
Further down the line in the season, things that have always brought the deepest sorrow around my understanding of her experience in this current circumstance, and her circumstances that we have not seen, have been a true pleasure and emotional catharsis that I didn't know that I needed around her pain.
The show has less action than you might expect from something based on this game. From your perspective, were you surprised by that approach? Were you expecting to have more action sequences when you started?
Merle Dandridge: I think that the emotional tether that connects the audience to the character's journey is in those quiet places of reconciling their absolutely agonizing circumstances to their now. And I think that those are things that, as human beings, we are constantly finding the balance of in our lives. I think it's something deeply relatable about how we maneuver around how love lifts and breaks us. And I think that the quiet places in the show open you up to the nuance of that relationship.
We already know that Pedro Pascal's a hell of an actor, but when did you know filming that he is definitely Joel? Was there any particular point where you knew that, "Hey, there's chemistry here, this is really going to work?"
Merle Dandridge: The first moment on set. The very first time we ever met was outside of the bathrooms, and we just happened to pass each other in full costume. And it was really interesting to see the outstanding background actors walking by and catching these characters that they probably knew in the flesh and see. And so to see it through their eyes that we're outside of the bathroom like, "Oh, look at you, you look so cool. Oh my gosh, I can't believe it. Oh, look at this detail. I can't believe it."
And then to go to the set right after that and jump into the tension opposite them, I was like, "Oh man, this guy, he's the truth and the light, man." He had all of those things, which was the very multifaceted, deeply nuanced pain that this man is in. But with the ability to bring that special magical twinkle and a smile that only Pedro can do.
You've been with the series for so long. What surprised you the most about what the show is doing to distinguish itself from the games?
Merle Dandridge: I think its fearlessness to deviate from the canon. And when it does that, it is more of the specific kind of pull at the heartstrings that only this world can do. To see some of the characters in new scenarios that break your heart even more deeply for them is something that I don't know that people thought was even possible. So, to get that opportunity and to know that with the hands of these creators and these artists, that there really isn't a limit to how much more you're going to get out of this world. It kind of makes you feel like every day's Christmas.
About The Last Of Us
Based on the wildly popular 2013 video game of the same name The Last Of Us takes place in a post-apocalyptic world ravaged by a fungal outbreak. The series follows Joel, a hardened smuggler, tasked with escorting 14-year olf Ellie across the ravaged United States in hopes of finding a cure.
Check out our other The Last of Us interviews here:
The Last Of Us premieres on HBO and HBO Max on January 15.