Posted by: @fantasia

But until we have that news (they're only just now starting the casting process) I wanted to go ahead and open this thread to see if any of you have any ideas for a 10-11 year old actor from the UK to play Digory?

Oh wow. A tough assignment. I'll start though with an actor that Nina Gold will already be familiar with, and that is from the recent film 'Blitz' starring Saorirse Ronan.

About 30 mins into that film, the main child (played by Elliot Heffernan) having jumped off his evacuation train out of London, stows away on-board a freight train heading back in the other direction, where he meets 3 brothers. The eldest of these 3 brothers is named Tommy and, is played by Thomas Aitch

You can catch the tail-end of his scene, where he dares the main character to climb up onto the train roof here:

Blitz (2024) Movie Clip 'Train Roof' | Steve McQueen's WWII Drama Starring Saoirse Ronan

Obviously its very difficult to judge any actor's range based on such a small scene - I don't even know if he's using his real accent - but i thought he handled himself well, gave good energy, and has the right look for someone like Digory, so perhaps that's a good starting point.

Its a shame the preceding part of that scene isn't available online, because it has some nice little nice moments between the various children.

Thomas Aitch - IMDb

Thomas Aitch (@thomas_aitch1) • Instagram photos and videos

The lead in Blitz (Heffernan) was 11 when they filmed it, and Thomas looks a little bit younger that him, so i'd assume he's still within age range. Apparently he was also in Ted Lasso as well, though i cant recall where.

It's worth noting that this is the same age as in the casting call for Hallmark's new Harry Potter, last October. That was asking for 9-11 year olds living in UK or Ireland. By mid 2025 they will be 10 or 11. 

First of all, I want to officially give a shout-out to David McKenna for being cast in the role of Digory Kirke, and a great big welcome to Narnia! I for one am excited to see your interpretation of this role!  

None of the rest of this post is really originally by me and the vast majority of the credit for the concepts I'm about to type out go to @icarus and @impending-doom. But I guess I wanted to kind of compile everything currently being discussed here so I can refer back to it in a more obvious location at a later date. And at the time of writing this post, it's all speculation, nothing confirmed, and therefore, may all be wrong.  

So some notes that seem to imply the direction that Ms. Gerwig is taking with this character based off of clues that have been gathered around the interwebs.

1. Digory seems to be a very lonely and sad boy. This is accurate to the book due to his mother's illness and his father isn't even in the picture. We've seen a few shots of him walking along the streets of London, alone, and with a rather dour look on his face. This is in no way meant to be judgmental at all, but I find it interesting that he's being portrayed as a little on the short and chubby side, sadly, often a target for bullies. 
2. @impending-doom points out in this post here the idea that Digory may pull many details from C.S. Lewis's own life. I won't copy them all over here, but I think he has some very good points!
3. The working title for the film is an Ordinary Time. Pulling from @icarus 's post here, perhaps this references's Digory's line at the end of the book where he tells Jadis that he'd rather live an ordinary time here on Earth and die, than live an eternal life like her.

So with all of those "clues" as to a potential character arc for Digory, I just wanted to think about that for a bit. I find it very plausible that that's where Gerwig is headed with her North Star comments for the book. So what will happen in the movie, to take Digory from a sad and lonely boy at the beginning who is actively watching his mother die to refusing the witch's offer for eternal life at the climax of the story? This theme is 100% in the book, but I have a hard time thinking in my own head what some of the specific steps are that would have Digory arrive at that decision. Was it because he screwed up so badly when he rang the bell he wasn't willing to make another bad choice? Was there more to Aslan's comforting tears that somehow helped Digory to understand? Will it be his friendship with Polly? Or perhaps the realization of what's seeing his Uncle Andrew start down the same path as the witch with their "high and lonely destiny"? Or perhaps a little bit of all of the above? 

At any rate, all of this together make for (imho) a deep dive into the character of Digory that isn't quite so fleshed out as in the book. At least that's my great hope, because all of these hints (albeit, maybe wishful thinking) seem to point in a potentially very accurate interpretation of the character of Digory, and I'm very excited about that. 

For me, the other big informative part of Digory's character arc is likely to be the context of Greta Gerwig herself as a writer, and as a mother.

Based on the timeline, it seems that she would have been pregnant with her second child (Isadore) whilst she was writing the script, therefore its perhaps no surprise she chose that name for Digory's audition alias, rather than her first child (Harold) .... although I guess there's always the possibility that its the other way around and she named her son after an audition script she had just written!

Given also the touching "Harold & Isadore" posters we've seen in some of the set decorations, I do expect Greta Gerwig's perspective as a relatively new mother to factor into the characterisation of Digory and his relationship with his own mother.

******

Also, as a minor bit of background detail on Digory's home location, i get the impression from looking at all the set photos, that he lives in the East End of London, based on the amount of bomb-damaged locations, the fact that he walks past a canal-side Fish Market, the fact that they are within riding distance of the Tower of London, and just the overall urban industrial aesthetic they seem to be going for with a lot of the sets so far.

The outlier here is of course the scene shot at the Albert Bridge which is all the way on the other side of the city, but its unclear exactly how strict on real-world geography they intend to be. The canal-side fish market to me though definitely suggests something in the old docklands area of East London.

The book is as far as i can tell somewhat vague on its geography, though it does reference the former Colney Hatch mental asylum in North London, and (in some versions) the Trocadero in Central London. as well as more famous landmarks like Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament.

I almost posted this in the Could Gerwig be using Digory to bring more of Lewis himself into Narnia? thread, but figured it fit better here,

Digory's experience of being lonely/bullied at school also fits in with his distrust of Polly (as per the initial audition script), where she has to convince him that she's "not like the others". Digory even admits in the script that he doesn't "have any friends".

Lewis had already written a book about bullying and lack of friends. (SC)  
Digory in the book has recently come to London, so he has few friends yet, therefore he's lonely. His mother is sick and can't spend time with him, which would have otherwise lessened his loneliness.
But going to school and being bullied adds an extra dimension that I'm not convinced is helpful.