The Cast of 'The Last Of Us': Everything to Know

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The Last of Us is one of HBO's most-watched series ever, clocking in millions of viewers every Sunday night (and even more on streaming).

The series follows the aftermath of an apocalyptic fungal infection and efforts to help find a cure, while survivors must cope with violence from the government, as well as revolutionary factions. Of course, the cordyceps fungal infection pandemic plotline has a lot to do with the show's success, but the cast is what brings the video game adaptation's story to life — and it's a particularly star-studded group, with a handful of HBO alumni.

Stars Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey each had memorable turns in Game of Thrones, while supporting players Rutina Wesley starred in True Blood and Murray Bartlett won an Emmy for White Lotus.

Series co-creator Craig Mazin said casting Ramsey in particular was a no-brainer.

"What makes Ellie so fascinating is that she has a lot of the fear and exuberance of a child, but also this strange, sad, heavy, beautiful wisdom and violence," Mazin told GQ. "What you're waiting for [in casting] is the person that makes it undeniable, where you're like, 'Oh, we're done. Everything's okay.' And that was Bella."

Mazin said the chemistry between Ramsey and Pascal was easy thanks to co-creator Neil Druckmann's beloved video game, on which the series is based, as well as to the talent of the show's leads.

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"We didn't have to find that chemistry. Neil and I understood the chemistry from a dramatic point of view. We poured all of that into the page. It obviously is all taken from Neil's game. That's why we're all here, that relationship between Joel and Ellie in The Last of Us 2013," Mazin told ScreenRant, adding that though they knew Pascal and Ramsey embodied "the spirit and soul of Joel and the spirit and soul of Ellie," it was impossible to know if it would all click until the start of filming.

"I was directing that episode when they come together for the first time, and I just remember sitting back in my chair going, 'We're going to be okay,' " Mazin explained. "They just had something, and the chemistry that they have both on and off the set is remarkable."

Ahead, get to know the rest of The Last of Us cast and their characters.

Pedro Pascal as Joel Miller

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Pedro Pascal is really great at playing a somewhat unwilling father figure: In addition to playing Joel, Ellie's guardian in The Last of Us, his playful paternal relationship with Grogu in The Mandalorian sent Pascal's star power soaring in 2019.

Touching on the parallels between Joel and Din Djarin, Pascal, 47, told Collider, "They're both very, very grumpy, aren't they? And they're reluctant, hardened figures under their own different forms of armor. The more I talk, the less difference there is between them," he said.

Pascal's first taste of mainstream fame came when he played Oberyn Martell in Game of Thrones season 4, enduring one of the award-winning HBO series' most brutal deaths. When Esquire asked Pascal how he felt about his character's sendoff (spoiler alert: his head is squeezed in a duel until it bursts), the Chilean-born actor took it in stride.

"Makes me feel like a boss! If I'm actually up there and if I'm in the top three, I mean then like, everything thereafter is a bit futile," he said. "It's like, what am I doing? Why am I still trying? I did it."

Following his memorable turn in Game of Thrones, Pascal went on to star in Kingsmen: The Secret Circle and Narcos, followed by his breakout performance in The Mandalorian.

Pascal previously revealed that he forgot that he got hired to play Joel in The Last of Us because he'd taken Ambien the night before.

"I get a call that I got the job after I took the Ambien, and so I was excited I guess, but I didn't remember," Pascal said on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. "I woke up in the morning and the first thing that occurred to me was like, 'Oh man, I really want that job.' "

"I'm in London, they're in L.A., I'm gonna wait by the phone all day long, this hasn't happened in a while, I'm gonna be longing and I'm gonna think about it all day long," he recalled. "And then it was like, 'Congratulations, I'm so happy for you!' when I looked at my phone. And I was like, 'Oh yeah, I got the job!' "

While hosting Saturday Night Live on Feb. 5, 2023, Pascal joked about the filming conditions for The Last of Us while comparing his experience to that of another HBO hit, The White Lotus.

"For some HBO shows, you get to shoot in a five-star Italian resort surrounded by beautiful people, but I said, 'No, that's too easy.' I wanna shoot in a freezing Canadian forest while being chased around by a guy whose head looks like a genital wart," he quipped during his opening monologue.

Bella Ramsey as Ellie Williams

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Fellow Game of Thrones alum Bella Ramsey stars as Ellie Williams, a young girl with immunity to the cordyceps fungal infection in The Last of Us. The actor, who identifies as gender fluid, said it can be difficult to separate herself from her character.

"People always ask, at the end of a shoot day, how I get back into being Bella," she told The New York Times. "But I didn't know how to do that with Ellie because we were so intertwined." Ramsey explained that she felt a connection to Ellie for "reasons [she] couldn't describe," and explained that she avoided playing the video game but watched the cutaway scenes "to feel confident that the Ellie I felt inside of me, under my skin, was the right one."

"It's only recently that I've accepted I am Ellie, and I can do it, and I am a good actor," Ramsey, 19, said. "But this will last for a few weeks and then I'll think I'm terrible again. That's just the process."

Prior to The Last of Us, Ramsey starred in Catherine Called Birdy alongside Joe Alwyn, receiving a Critics Choice Award nomination for best young actor/actress. Though she and Pascal both appeared in Game of Thrones (which was her first professional acting gig), they weren't on the series at the same time.

"We didn't get as chance to meet or bond before we started filming. We were very much just thrown in, and that chemistry was just there immediately and just grew and developed as Joel and Ellie's did," Ramsey explained to Game Rant. "As their relationship developed so did ours. I think that was a very nice parallel and, yeah, maybe it was intentional on [co-creator] Neil [Druckmann] and [co-creator] Craig's [Mazin] behalf. To not give us time to like meet and bond. I think it worked really well."

Anna Torv as Tess

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Anna Torv had a memorable turn as the smuggler Tess on The Last Of Us, and her performance — albeit brief — was acclaimed.

In the series' second episode, after being bitten by an Infected, Torv's character sacrifices herself to help Joel and Ellie move forward on their journey to the Fireflies. The emotional scene is one Torv believes Joel and Tess likely discussed beforehand.

"As far as what she does, I believe that that's probably a conversation that Tess and Joel had many, many, many, times," Torv, 43, told TV Guide. "Like, 'If one of us gets bit' — I'm sure they would have had it — like, 'Please don't let me turn out like them.' "

Prior to The Last of Us, the Australian actor costarred with Joshua Jackson on Fringe, earning several Saturn Awards and a Critics Choice Award nomination, and appeared in Netflix's Mindhunter.

Torv told Inverse that she hadn't played The Last of Us video game, but knew a bit about the storyline. "I remember really clearly it coming out, I remember seeing a clip for it with the song and people talking about it. I think I looked it up too because I was interested in it because it was so character-driven," she recalled. "I'd done a game ages ago with motion capture, and this was quite a bit later. The technology had just improved so much, it was amazing."

"Then when this project came up, I read the scripts first. And then I went back and watched all of the cutscenes of the game," she continued. "But I'm a terrible gamer. So I did not play it, I would not have been able to get through it."

Gabriel Luna as Tommy Miller

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Prior to The Last of Us, Gabriel Luna starred as the Robbie Reyes iteration of Ghost Rider in Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and as the villain in Terminator: Dark Fate; he also appeared in True Detective Season 2, NCIS: Los Angeles and the film Freeheld.

In The Last of Us, Luna stars as Joel's idealistic younger brother and former soldier, Tommy Miller. In season 1 episode 6, Joel and Tommy reunite to find Tommy thriving in a commune in Jackson, Wyoming, married to the town leader with a baby on the way.

"He's in the process of rebuilding, reconstructing his spirit, reconstructing his heart, and building a family of his own," Luna, 40, explained to TV Guide. "In my mind, it was much like in the game in terms of the context clues we get playing the game. Tommy knows the horrors of war. He has trauma that he was already in the process of healing when the outbreak happens."

Luna explained that he thinks Tommy can't do what Joel did in terms of committing unspeakable acts for the sake of survival anymore, especially after coming to terms with his own past in Operation Desert Storm.

"I think Tommy is just the type of person — he is that empathetic person. He breaks. He can no longer do that. And I think if he is going to use his affinity for violence, or at least his skills in combat if he's going to use those, I think he diverts his efforts and his energy towards being a revolutionary, being a Firefly," he said.

Luna will soon costar again with Arnold Schwarzenegger (whom he first appeared alongside in 2019's Terminator: Dark Fate) in the Netflix spy series FUBAR. The actor revealed that he lives by a piece of Schwarzenegger's advice in dealing with commentary about being a Latinx man playing Tommy, who was originally white in The Last of Us video game.

"The love is always stronger than the passing snide comment or racist remark. The love is what endures beyond that moment of that verbal strike. But I went through it already. I went through it with Ghost Rider," he told Esquire, later adding, "As Arnold always says, 'Never listen to the naysayers.' It's one of his seven rules of success."

Rutina Wesley as Maria

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Rutina Wesley's role as Tommy's wife and Jackson, Wyoming, commune leader Maria is her third go-round with HBO, previously starring in DMZ and True Blood. She knew she wanted to play Maria in part because she's so fierce.

"I loved Maria, particularly because she's a born leader," Wesley told Entertainment Weekly. "She's fierce and she has this calm stillness to her that I love. She's the type of woman that I described like, if she smiles, you probably only see it with her eyes. She's not gonna give you full-blown Rutina red carpet teeth."

Wesley looks forward to hopefully reprising the role of Maria in Season 2, as her role in the games is bigger in The Last of Us Part II. "I'm excited," she said. "I'm looking forward to something if they decide to come my way. I'm totally excited about that, because I did have fun playing with Gabe. He's really great."

She added, "It would just be like icing on the cake. This is enough where it is 'cause it is a huge hit. So if it didn't happen, I'd be great with it because this show is really good."

Nick Offerman as Bill

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Nick Offerman is best known for playing the hilarious Libertarian Ron Swanson in Parks and Recreation. The 52-year-old funny man almost turned down the role of survivalist Bill in The Last of Us until his off-screen wife, Megan Mullally, convinced him to take the job.

"I didn't have time on the calendar to say 'yes' to this job, and my incredible goddess of a wife read [the script] — and she said 'You're going to Calgary, buddy,' " Offerman recalled on Jimmy Kimmel Live. "'Have fun! You have to do this.' "

Offerman's dramatic turn as a hardened doomsday prepper who finds that his soulmate literally fell into his life earned what the actor called a "wonderful tsunami of plaudits;" the episode is regarded as a career-best performance for the star.

In addition to The Last of Us and Parks and Rec, Offerman's appeared in comedies including We're the Millers, 21 and 22 Jump Street, Pam & Tommy and the upcoming Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning. He's lent his voice to The Lego Movie, Sing, Sing 2, Bob's Burgers and The Great North. Offerman is also an accomplished woodworker and boat builder, as well as an author of four books.

Murray Bartlett as Frank

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Murray Bartlett starred as Frank, the love of Bill's life who lived with Offerman's character in his survivalist compound. In the video game, we only see Frank as a corpse, and his relationship with Bill is implied — as well as acrimonious. In the Last of Us series, however, their relationship is heartfelt and loving, and they're together for decades until a degenerative illness becomes too much for Frank to bear.

Bartlett admired the "extraordinary job" that the hair and makeup team did in aging him for the show. "I will say, my partner who I watched the episode with was really affected by it," Bartlett told The Independent. "He turned to me at the end and was like, 'I don't want you to get sick!' So he really internalized it and obviously had trouble separating [from] the fact that he was watching me in a TV show, which I think is a good sign." He added jokingly, "Not a good sign about me possibly getting sick as an old man, but the integrity of the work was powerful for him."

Prior to his powerful turn in The Last of Us, Bartlett won an Emmy for his role of Armond in season 1 of HBO's The White Lotus and starred in Looking, Physical and Welcome to Chippendales.

"One of the things that I love about being an actor is that it's always unpredictable. You don't know what's next. I've never really known what's next," Bartlett told Collider about his varied roles throughout his career. "I've been really fortunate, in the last year or so, to have some choices and to have these amazing roles come my way. It's felt like this treasure chest to me. Honestly, in the last year, I haven't had a lot of time in between to think, which has been a new experience for me, and really thrilling."

He added, "I feel very lucky that I have and do have choices because it's a new thing for me to be able to choose a role that I want to play, or have a few choices. I'm relishing that, and I'm thrilled that these amazing characters have come my way."

Lamar Johnson as Henry Burrell

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Toronto native Lamar Johnson starred as Henry in The Last of Us, with previous roles in The Hate U Give, hip-hop dance film The Next Step, Your Honor and All the Bright Places.

Johnson was a fan of The Last of Us video game and was excited to audition for Henry. "I'm just really grateful that it happened, and that it also happened so fast. I sent in my tape on Monday, by Wednesday, I got the call that I got the job, and then by Saturday, I was on a plane to Calgary," he recalled to Collider.

Another aspect of production that happened quickly, out of necessity, was Johnson's learning American Sign Language to communicate with costar Keivonn Woodard on and off-screen as Sam. The actor worked with an ASL director and multiple interpreters on set to help him, and he spent his off time "doing homework" to learn the language as quickly as possible.

"It was important for me to do it in a way that felt organic and natural because the actor playing Sam is deaf in real life and I understand that we are representing a community of people," he explained to Collider.

In the game, as well as the series, Henry kills Sam when Sam gets infected, then takes his own life. Johnson didn't take the heavy material lightly.

"How I interpreted that scene, for me, I mean it's the big scene, it's the Henry and Sam scene. I know the weight of that scene and the importance of that scene, especially with me knowing about the game, understanding the game, and being a fan of the game," Johnson told Deadline.

He continued, "I guess going into it, I kind of knew what we were doing that day. I think I just tried to be as present and authentic as possible because everything was given to me. I had Keivonn there, I had Pedro there, I had Bella there, and they were all reacting and giving me what I needed for me to perform. I tried not to overthink it."

Keivonn Woodard as Sam Burrell

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Keivonn Woodard stars as Sam in The Last of Us. Like his character, Woodard is deaf and communicates through American Sign Language, which was changed for the series. The Last of Us was his very first acting role; on The Last of Us podcast, Mazin said that Sam's character was aged down from the video game so he'd look up to Ellie.

In the show, Sam paints his face to feel like a superhero. Woodard, 10, told Deadline that he works hard to feel courageous on and off-screen, explaining, "My father passed away and someone told me that it's really important that I be strong. And as a Black person, it is important. I use that memory to look inside myself and motivate myself to be brave, even if there are frustrations or struggles. I do my best to be brave. Also, Miles Morales is my favorite superhero."

Woodard also told Deadline that he enjoyed the entire process, despite his and Johnson's characters' heartbreaking endings — and even with the Infected and clickers.

"With all of the creatures and clickers, I got to meet them beforehand; that way, I got an idea of what they looked like, so I wasn't as scared of them," he said. "It was really good working with them and with Lamar, Pedro and Bella. I had a lot of fun, especially with the clickers. It all went really well."

In addition to acting, Woodard is an avid hockey fan and hopes to be the first deaf Black player in the NHL.

Melanie Lynskey as Kathleen Coghlan

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Melanie Lynskey has a star turn as Kathleen Coghlan, a leader of a brutal revolutionary regime based in Kansas City. The New Zealand native, who's also starred in Coyote Ugly, Ever After, Candy and Yellowjackets, told Vulture that The Last of Us co-creator Craig Mazin offered her the role in a blunt way: "He called me and said, 'I would love for you to play a war criminal.' "

Kathleen, an original character created for the show, becomes ruthless after Henry gets her brother killed, which Lynskey says took away the last shred of her character's conscience and empathy for others.

"She discovers that she doesn't have a ton of humanity. She's able to do things that are quite brutal without really batting an eyelash," Lynskey, 45, said. "And I think that that's quite a scary thing for her to understand about herself, but also kind of an exciting thing."

Still, Lynskey admitted she wasn't entirely sold right away, but that her husband, Jason Ritter, helped convince her to take the role.

"I'm never immediately in because I'm so tired all the time," she said with a laugh. "I was doing Candy — I was in the middle of crazy stunt rehearsals for the big ax fight at the end. The Last of Us is Calgary in the winter. But Jason was like, 'Are you insane? It's the greatest video game of all time.' "

Lynskey said that Mazin emailed her and promised to make the process as simple as possible for her, including bringing her nanny, letting her stay near a playground and even helping her find a house and things to do in Calgary.

"Then he sent me a link to a story about my best friend, Clea DuVall's show High School, which was shooting there," she said. "I was like, 'Okay, when you sent me the scripts, I was sold.' Sometimes you just push through your exhaustion if it's worth it."

Lynskey fired back at body-shamers during her tenure on the series, including America's Next Top Model alum Adrianne Curry, who tweeted a photo of Lynskey and wrote that "Her body says life of luxury…not post-apocolyptic [sic] warlord. where is linda hamilton when you need her?"

"Firstly — this is a photo from my cover shoot for InStyle magazine, not a still from HBO's The Last Of Us," Lynskey replied to Curry. "And I'm playing a person who meticulously planned & executed an overthrow of [government agency] FEDRA. I am supposed to be SMART, ma'am. I don't need to be muscly. That's what henchmen are for."

She added, "I understand that some people are mad that I'm not the typical casting for this role. That's thrilling to me. Other than the moments after action is called, when you feel like you're actually in someone else's body, the most exciting part of my job is subverting expectations."

Jeffrey Pierce as Perry

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Appearing in The Last of Us was a full-circle moment for Jeffrey Pierce, who voiced Tommy in the original video game. And though Pierce didn't play the same character in the series (he instead starred as Kathleen's right-hand man, Perry), he loved Gabriel Luna's take on Tommy.

"I think that Gabriel did an amazing job of paying tribute to the character that we created for the games. When I say 'we,' I mean 50 people touched that role before I ever picked up a script and auditioned for it — and then after I left the stage, 200 or 300 people created Tommy's performance," he told Vulture. "Gabriel came in and honored that performance, which is humbling. My daughter looked up at me and said, 'Dad, he sounds just like you!' It's like, yeah, he does, but then he brings all of himself and all of his life and history to it."

Pierce said that while he didn't necessarily predict that The Last of Us would become a smash hit TV series, he wasn't shocked by it, either.

"I'm an optimistic person. If you asked me 13 years ago if this would happen, I would've said, 'F---yeah, probably! That's as probable as anything.' The story is so simple and well told. It's not surprising that this is what Craig and Neil have achieved, that 21 million people are watching these episodes," he said.

Merle Dandridge as Marlene

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Merle Dandridge is the only actor to reprise her role in The Last of Us video game and in the HBO series.

"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," Dandridge told Screen Rant.

There were stark differences in the process of playing Marlene in the games and the show, but the "emotional tether" remained in both, Dandridge said.

"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," she said. "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.' "

She added, "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."

Before appearing in The Last of Us, Dandridge performed in several Broadway musicals including Jesus Christ Superstar and Rent. She also had recurring roles on shows like Sons of Anarchy and The Night Shift, in addition to starring in The Flight Attendant and Station 19.

Nico Parker as Sarah

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Nico Parker, daughter of Ol Parker and Thandiwe Newton, starred as Joel's daughter Sarah in the first episode of The Last of Us. In both the game and the series, Sarah is shot and killed by soldiers as she, Joel and Tommy try to escape the early days of the cordyceps apocalypse.

Parker, who previously starred in Disney's live-action Dumbo, told TV Line that costar Pascal advised her not to watch her character's death scene in the video game. "'It's going to freak you out,' " she recalled him telling her. "I take his word as the gospel, so I was like, 'OK! I'm not watching!' "

In terms of filming the heartbreaking scene, Parker said, "I was incredibly stressed. It's an iconic moment. I have cried at that moment, myself, prior to even in any way being involved in the show. So I think I was very aware of how important it was to kind of execute it appropriately."

Storm Reid as Riley

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Storm Reid starred as Riley, a friend of Ellie's who made her series debut in a flashback-themed episode 7. In The Last of Us, Riley and Ellie are each bitten at the same time, leading Ellie to realize she was immune to the cordyceps infection.

Reid is an accomplished actress at just 19. She made her movie debut in 12 Years a Slave in 2013 and later starred as Meg Murry in A Wrinkle In Time in 2018, earning an NAACP Image Award for outstanding breakthrough role in a motion picture. She followed the acclaimed role with Netflix's When They See Us, The Invisible Man and The Suicide Squad. Reid is a series regular on Euphoria, in which she stars as Rue (Zendaya)'s little sister Gia; she most recently starred in Missing and can be seen next in The Nun 2.

In addition to acting, Reid is also a college student at the University of Southern California. "I was feeling very fulfilled as a young person that was working but not necessarily as a young person experiencing young-people things," she previously told PEOPLE. "I get to experience things that people will never get to experience in their lifetime, which I'm cognizant of and I'm very grateful for. But I do want to go to the football games, I do want to go to the parties, I do want to just go hang out with my friends and walk around campus at 3:00 AM sometimes."

Scott Shepherd as David

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Scott Shepherd starred as David, the leader of a religious group based in Colorado, in episode 8 of the series. While his character appears benevolent at first, it is later revealed that the group are cannibals and that David intends to keep Ellie alive for very dark reasons.

Prior to his sinister role as David, Shepherd appeared in several movies and TV shows, including Breaking Bad, Jason Bourne, True Detective and X-Men: Dark Phoenix.

Troy Baker as James

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Troy Baker, who voices Joel in The Last of Us video game, made an appearance on the HBO adaption during episode 8 as cult leader David's right-hand man, James. Although his original role went to Pascal, Baker was glad to be included and enjoyed the challenge of making James more than just a villain.

"Look, I thought I was going to be a clicker. So, this is an upgrade," he told Deadline. "I was so happy. And then, when reading the script for James, I was like, 'OK, there's a good challenge.' "

He continued, "I love playing a villain to show you he's not the villain. Because if I can make you like him for just a second, that makes you hate him even more when I need you to. I love that dance."

Baker has also enjoyed what Pascal has brought to the role, as he explained to Entertainment Weekly. "I had the opportunity to play it once and I left everything on the dance floor," he said. "The thing that I would've lamented is if whoever was tapped to play Joel didn't teach me something new, that they just did the same thing that I did and it became an impression of a performance rather than a character. That's the thing that I've been the most delighted about with Pedro. He brought something so new to this role."

Aside from his work on The Last of Us, Baker has lent his voice to countless other video games, including God of War: Ragnarök, Uncharted and Fortnite, as well as several TV shows — Family Guy, American Dad! and Rick and Morty to name a few. He also voiced several Batman characters, including Bruce Wayne and Joker, in various mediums.

Ashley Johnson as Anna Williams

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Ashley Johnson starred as Anna Williams, Ellie's mother, in the season 1 finale, and it's a poignant role — because she starred as Ellie in the video games.

Co-creator Druckmann said he was excited to bring Ellie's mom to life in the HBO series, explaining to Variety, "The one that shows up very late in the season is Ellie's mom ... We brought it to life in the most beautiful, poetic way, which is Ashley Johnson playing Ellie's mom and she was the original actor for Ellie."

As for Johnson, viewers will likely recognize her from Growing Pains, in which she played youngest child Chrissy Seaver, as well as Mel Gibson's teenage daughter in What Women Want. Most recently, Johnson starred as Patterson in Blindspot.