'Prodigal Son': Michael Sheen's transformation into a serial killer proves he is the best thing on American television right now
Few actors consistently deliver top-notch performances in all the roles they take up and even fewer make it impossible for audiences to picture someone else playing the same character. One actor who has managed to do so with every character he played on television in 2019 is Michael Sheen.
In Amazon Prime's 'Good Omens', which is based on a book by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Michael Sheen played the angel from heaven, Aziraphale. Good-natured, kind and practically the best angel you have ever seen portrayed on television, Sheen delivered an endearing performance opposite David Tennant's Crowley. In May, when the series released, we wrote how the series actually sails on the shoulders of Sheen and Tennant's charming angel-demon camaraderie. "On the performance front, 'Good Omens' is an absolute delight. Michael Sheen is brilliant as a fussy angel and David Tennant does an entertaining portrayal of the demon Crowley. However, it really is their chemistry that carries the show. The series sails on the shoulders of this partnership and, when they are offscreen, 'Good Omens' no longer feels charming," our review read.
Sheen's Aziraphale was a big contrast to his previous role on 'The Good Fight' as Roland Blum. As Blum, Sheen played "a man of appetites — drugs, sex, you name it — who’s far more interested in winning than the niceties of following the law". In his own words, Blum was a character unlike anything he had played before. To offer a fair idea of Blum's character on 'The Good Fight', in an episode titled 'The One Inspired by Roy Cohn,' Michael Sheen roars into Robert and Michelle King’s drama — half-naked and snorting coke while being fellated. His character, attorney Roland Blum, then turns his back to the camera to reveal Roger Stone’s face, tattooed between his shoulder blades. Blum idolizes Stone, so — just as Stone has a tattoo of Richard Nixon’s face on his back, Blum has one of Stone’s face on his own. By the end of the episode, the successful lawyer has sucked on a fentanyl lollipop, pushed an opium suppository up his butt, and thrown a rival’s case notes out a window."
Blum was a character that even the audiences never imagined Sheen play. But boy did he excel. In an interview, he had said, "Blum wasn’t like anything I’d played before. He had to just explode into the series, and kind of just dominate everything to the point where everyone else had to react. We would find out more about all the main characters in terms of how they reacted to this character. That frankly sort of scared me. And I liked that." This scene between Rose Leslie's Maia and Sheen's Blum alone highlights the animal that his character was.
In his upcoming show 'Prodigal Son', Sheen is set to play the role of a serial killer Dr Martin Whitly, known as The Surgeon, who has killed 23 people before being arrested. As it turns out, his family, friends, and neighbors are all surprised—and relieved—when he is caught.
Sheen's multiple transformations this year alone have been exciting, to say the least. From playing the fussy angel in 'Good Omens' to the ruthless lawyer in Roland Blum to now playing the serial killer The Surgeon on 'Prodigal Son', his choice in picking characters is commendable. Perhaps the best way to describe Sheen playing his characters is that these roles fit him like a glove—it is a delight to watch him play these roles.
'Prodigal Son' will premiere on Fox on September 23, 2019, at 9 PM ET/PT.