The first trailer for Mike Flanagan’s The Fall of the House of Usher dropped today. The Netflix horror-drama miniseries draws inspiration from several Edgar Allan Poe stories, especially the 1839 gothic short story “The Fall of the House of Usher.”
In the trailer, Roderick Usher (Bruce Greenwood) repeats the word “nevermore” over and over, which is the same word used so effectively in Poe’s poem “The Raven.” The intense orchestral music in the trailer is appropriately Giuseppe Verdi’s “Requiem,” specifically the “Dies Irae” — or “funeral march”– movement. The music accompanies startling images of the doomed family as fate closes in on them.
The Fall of the House of Usher Has a Scary-Good Cast
The Fall of the House of Usher was created by Mike Flanagan, the director of Oculus, Ouija: Origin of Evil, and Doctor Sleep, as well as the creator of The Haunting of Hill House, Midnight Mass, and The Midnight Club. In The Fall of the House of Usher, Greenwood plays the CEO of a corrupt pharmaceutical company whose children start dying in brutal and disturbing ways. Mary McDonnell plays Madeline Usher, his twin sister. Other key players include Carla Gugino as the shape-shifting Verna, Samantha Sloyan as Tamerlane Usher, Rahul Kohli as Napoleon Usher, Sauriyan Sapkota as Prospero Usher, Henry Thomas as Frederick Usher, Kate Siegel as Camille L’Espanaye, Carl Lumbly as police investigator C. Auguste Dupin, T’Nia Miller as Victorine LaFourcade, Katie Parker as Annabel Lee, Michael Trucco as Rufus Wilmot Griswold, and Mark Hamill as family attorney Arthur Pym. The supporting cast includes Paola Nuñez as Dr. Alessandra Ruiz and Annabeth Gish as Eliza.
Gugino reportedly referred to her character as “the executor of fate or the executor of karma” when she spoke with Netflix’s official website, Tudum. “It’s batshit crazy in the best possible way,” says Gugino. “It has quite a lot of very dark humor, but also really touches the soul. There is a fantastical supernatural element to the story, and she is the manifestation of that.”
According to Variety, “Flanagan created the series and serves as director alongside Michael Fimognari, with the two directing four episodes each. Executive producers include Flanagan and Trevor Macy through their Intrepid Pictures banner, as well as Fimognari and Emmy Grinwis.”
The Fall of the House of Usher premieres on Netflix on October 12. All eight episodes drop at the same time, the first of which is directed and written by Flanagan.
