Rincewind HUH?

[timepiececlock]

Seems that the UK is putting out a miniseries verion of The Color of Magic this year.

Sean Astin has been cast as Twoflower, which is brilliant!, but I'm less than thrilled that Rincewind will be played by this guy. He may be a fine actor for all I know, but I keep getting distracted by the fact that he was born in the year NINETEEN HUNDRED AND FORTY. Which makes him 2 years older than the guy playing Cohen the Barbarian, which is just wrong on so many levels.

I can't remember if Rincewind's age is ever explicitly given, but I was always under the impression that he was on the younger side, anywhere between 24 and 40. A few decades less than 60, at least! I mean, what does Rincewind spend most of his time doing? Running. Which isn't to say that there aren't great marahoners who are 66 years old, but that's pretty rare. And Rincewind, well, he doesn't act like an older man, even compared to the other wizards in the books. And according to the series timeline, though I'm somewhat shaky on it, I got the impression that after becoming a wizard he spent some time as the Librarian's Assistant, but these were a few short happy years before Things Happened and people started chasing him for one reason or another.

Am I the only one who thought this? I mean, I remember in the second book I think, The Light Fantastic, that Rincewind looks at and talks to Cohen (a crabby old barbarian hero) as if Cohen were much older than himself. I find the idea very confusing... I always thought that a good actor for something like this would be an actor like David Tennant (for a younger one) or David Thewlis (for an older one)... someone skinny and brown-haired and normalish looking but with a shifty, slither-out-er look. Someone who talks very fast, points at a "monster" behind you, and then runs away as fast as he can. Someone pathetic but very good at surviving, who is terrible as a wizard but worth sticking to if you want to survive to the end of the book. Even that guy from The Office who played Arthur Dent would be a decent Rincewind.

The only reason I'm bent out of shape over this is that Rincewind is one of my very favorite Discworld characters, pretty much tied with the Lancre witches, and while I can adjust my thinking to accomadate different expectations in seeing a literary character cast in a tv show or film, I wasn't (and still am not) quite prepared to imagine him as 67 year old man. It's just... wrong. It's like being told that Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone is being cast with a college-aged man in the role of a 12 year old boy. Maybe he's very short and can fake it?

I dunno... maybe I missed the line in the text that said Rincewind is an older wizard, and have just been falsely imagining him as younger this whole time.

Comments

[flickums.livejournal.com]

I love Rincewind too and had it been made about 30 years ago then Eric Idle would have been perfect for him (he voiced Rincewind in the games and is just how I've always imagined him looking/sounding).

David Jason is providing the money for that production, which explains the choice of casting, but he was wrong as Alfred in Hogfather (which I'm not sure if you saw, if you haven't take a look at it - it was broadcast last Christmas and was quite nicely done apart from the occasional bit of miscasting).

Don't get me wrong, David Jason is a great actor. He just isn't Rincewind. At all. But I may yet be pleasantly surprised.

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

I will maintain my skepticism on the Rincewind thing, since apparently I'm not the only person who thought of him as a younger-to-middle aged person, but I'll probably watch the show anyway, and the rest of it might be good.

[jaina.livejournal.com]

Isn't Twoflower asian? Oh well, Sean Astin yay! And I agree re: Rincewind, I always pictured him starting out younger. Obviously getting somewhat older as the books go along.

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

Was he? I don't remember him with a specific ethnicity being given, just that he was an alien.

Rincewind, I always pictured him starting out younger. Obviously getting somewhat older as the books go along.

Yeah, I'm only 1/3 of the way through the books.

[jaina.livejournal.com]

It's not really given in those books, but in Interesting Times, we see his home and it's clearly the Discworld's asian continent.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

My estimate on his age was even more conservative than yours - I was guessing no later than mid-twenties.

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

I figured late 20s, maybe early 30s. A sort of middleish number, but the younger middle. I definitely thought of him as older than me and I'm technically mid-twenties this year, but still within ten years of my age.

[clodia-risa.livejournal.com]

I was thinking that 40 was pushing it. Ah well - hopefully they'll do it right. The Hogfather was generally excellent.

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

Is it worth watching, then? I might try to find it...

I would have thought of 40 as older too, but still acceptable.

[fani.livejournal.com]

Is it worth watching?

Not really. As adaptation goes, it's not very versatile like Stardust movie adaptation. It's stuck with being too faithful to the book.

[serhenya.livejournal.com]

I'm reading the book right now for the first time. When Rincewind and Twoflower are falling after Twoflower's dragon disappears, Rincewind tries to imagine a dragon to rescue them. They end up in another universe, in an airplane and someone else's body. Rincewind was in the body of a doctor that was listed as age 33. Since this is a parallel universe, I wonder if that also means that Rincewind is 33.