The Sandman boasts a cast of colorful, high-concept characters played by many skilled actors. Some of them, like Tom Sturridge (who plays the protagonist Morpheus, the king of dreams) and Kirby Howell-Baptiste (who plays his older sister, Death) had to overcome very competitive audition processes.
Mason Alexander Park, though, earned the role of Desire by… tweeting at The Sandman creator Neil Gaiman. Park is a non-binary actor, and Desire has been depicted as a non-binary character (the living embodiment of lust and sex) since Gaiman originally created them in the comic.
“I was a big fan of this comic, and I found out it was being made while I was in production on another project,” Park said as part of EW’s video interview with The Sandman cast at San Diego Comic-Con on Saturday. “I was very delirious at 4 in the morning in New Zealand, losing my mind in quarantine because they took everything very seriously, and I was like, ‘You know what? I think I’m gonna tweet at Neil and see if Desire’s been cast yet.’ That sort of started the conversation around doing the show. I’m very honored that was my introduction to everything. It’s been the gift that keeps on giving.”
“Thanks, Twitter!” Patton Oswalt, who plays the talking raven Matthew, exclaimed in response.
Laurence Cendrowicz/Netflix Desire (Mason Alexander Park) luxuriates in Netflix’s ‘The Sandman.’
Lest every actor on Earth immediately start filling up Gaiman’s Twitter mentions with requests to star in his next project, the author noted that Park’s message was particularly professional.
“You did the clever thing,” Gaiman said. “Instead of just going, ‘Hey, cast me as Desire,’ you asked, ‘Has Desire been cast yet?’ But the other half of your tweet, which was really important, was ‘who’s the casting director?’ I was like, oh, this is a real person reaching out. So I told you who the casting director was… and also quietly checked out a few of your videos and sent them over to [showrunner] Allan [Heinberg] and said, ‘Hey, I think we may have found Desire.”
Heinberg probably didn’t need much convincing — as he said earlier in the interview, he and Gaiman were basically on “the same wavelength” with every creative decision on the show.
Watch the full cast interview above. Stay tuned to EW for more coverage of Comic-Con 2022 and The Sandman (which premieres Aug. 5 on Netflix).
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