One of the hottest tickets in town at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) was for the primetime premiere of the new Crave supernatural mystery-thriller series YAGA, which is adapted from the hit stage play of the same name.
Festival attendees and fans weren't just treated to the world premiere of the show's first two episodes but also to a Q&A panel with members of the cast and creative team.
Series creator Kat Sandler, along with stars Carrie-Anne Moss, Noah Reid, and Clark Backo, reunited after last appearing together to introduce the show at Comic-Con over the summer, but they were also joined by actor Hudson Williams, who rose to fame earlier this year following the success of Crave's romance series Heated Rivalry.
In the show's original casting announcement, Williams was said to be playing Henry Park, a character who is also in the stage play. But things got much more mysterious last week after Crave revealed Williams would also be playing a new character named Logan.
When we spoke with showrunner Kat Sandler during Comic-Con, she was clear that every choice made in the half-hour series was extremely deliberate, from the character names, to the wardrobe, to the music, and many other small details woven throughout as witchy Easter eggs. So we cannot wait to see how the introduction of Logan as Henry Park's not-quite-doppelganger will play a role in the story.
How did Hudson Williams prepare for dual roles in YAGA?
When asked about his process for playing two characters, Hudson Williams opened up about how he had first underestimated the amount of time and work it would take to prepare for both roles simultaneously.
"Actually I was like, you just prep one and then two. Done. But what I found really difficult is you're never prepping one without always considering the other in relationship to the other person."
Williams went on to explain how thinking of both characters at all times become a job of its own, adding another layer to his prep work. "As much as I wanted to go into one and develop the cadence and the walk and the look, it was impossible not to consider if it's different enough or not close enough or too too cartoonish or whatever," Williams explained. "So there's just constant considerations. So it's sort of like trying to catch like two rabbits at once, and then both get away."
Check out the full interview from TIFF below to learn more about what you can expect from YAGA when it premieres later this fall.
Setting the mood for the season of the witch, YAGA's two-episode premiere is set for Friday, October 23 on Crave in Canada and on AMC+ in the US. The series will then release new episodes one at a time on Fridays until its wild two-episode finale on Friday, November 27.
Stay tuned for more news about YAGA and Heated Rivalry!
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