The White Lotus star Theo James says he had to 'wrestle' his way out of typecasting after Divergent role
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Theo James says he struggled with typecasting after his turn as Tobias (or "Four") Eaton in the Divergent film franchise.
The star of The White Lotus explained feeling wedded to blockbuster franchise roles in a new interview with Vanity Fair. "You do a certain type of film and you sign contracts where you are beholden to those roles for a certain period of time and people see you in a certain light that you have to wrestle your way out of," James said. "That is a hundred percent the case with actors — and it was definitely the case with me."
James portrayed the co-lead, a love interest to Shailene Woodley's Beatrice "Tris" Prior, in the 2014 YA sci-fi film and its sequels, 2015's Insurgent and 2016's Allegiant. The third film bombed at the box office, and a planned fourth film never reached fruition. The actor says he rejected the spotlight soon after and became "increasingly disillusioned" with what he referred to as "those types of films."
Jaap Buitendijk/Summit Entertainment Theo James in 'Divergent'
"I felt I didn't have the fluidity to move in the directions that I wanted," James said. "You're very much in a certain type of role — and those roles can be pretty f---ing boring."
There's nothing boring about James' latest role as Cameron, the cheeky and insufferable wealthy financier in season 2 of HBO's The White Lotus. His performance in the first episode, alone, is a doozy, with James baring it all in a scene in which his character strips down and changes in front of his best pal Ethan's (Will Sharpe) wife, Harper (Aubrey Plaza).
"I thought it was very interesting but also very White Lotus in a Mike [White, series creator] way,' James told EW of the scene.
"What he does is — this is Mike's writing — he treads the boundary of how calculated that was, or was it just easy-breezy?" he added. "On the day, we had to figure out what that was because the original derivation of it, it's kind of full-frontal, if you know what I mean. We shot that and it felt too much, too aggressive. What we came to is a bit more opaque, and that's exactly what Mike does so well. You're never sure a hundred percent of the characters' intentions."
New episodes of The White Lotus air Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.
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