Harry Lloyd & Toks Olagundoye Interview: Arcane League of Legends
Venture to the worlds of Piltover and Zaun in Netflix's Arcane. Serving as a prequel to the world of Riot Games' League of Legends, the series explores the origin stories of champions Jinx, Vi, Jayce, Viktor, and Caitlyn and how the impending war between the rich world of Piltover and the seedy underbelly of Zaun will forever change them.
Screen Rant spoke exclusively with Arcane stars Harry Lloyd and Toks Olagundoye to discuss bringing their League of Legends characters to life, their difference in video game tastes and the creative freedoms allotted to them during production on the animated show.
Screen Rant: What about the show really drew you both to it?
Harry Lloyd: We got very little information, I think, most of the cast before we signed on. First things first, it was just a great script, didn't matter what medium it was on or for who, really, I was like, "These are good characters, this is really interesting." Then once I sent off my little audition, I did it in the car, they then kind of welcomed us into this huge universe, I think none of us really realized what we got into.
Then it was just a huge bonus, not only in terms of, "Wow, this is a big deal, this game," but also the level of detail and the scale in the number of people that they have on it. We were really ushered in and made to feel very safe in quite a scary world and given so much information. So yeah, it was made really easy for us.
Once you connected with the scripts, did either of you feel the need to dive into the League of Legends games to better familiarize yourselves with the world and the characters?
Toks Olagundoye: I did not. Video games and me [don't mix]. I'm an old lady, but I can handle Tetris. [Laughs] My husband, however, has. I never really told him what I was doing and then when we started announcing things, he was like, "Oh, God, I'm going to get the game," so I'm going to enjoy it while he plays it.
Harry Lloyd: I started playing it today, actually, I did get more and more into the whole folklore and reading kind of fantasy stories and stuff about Viktor specifically, because his whole story and his mysterious backstory already had quite a lot of different versions already out there. So I was definitely interested in that, more out of curiosity than anything that I think would directly affect how we were doing it.
Because in terms of the recording, it was so specific, what was already there and what they wanted, and they were only up for us kind of playing around and finding new ideas. But I never felt even when we were recording that we felt that pressure from fans, "Oh, it's got to be like this, or we're gonna get in trouble." I think they were expanding it and taking this simple premise game that had led to all this complicated narrative stuff, taking that narrative and taking it even further. So we were already beyond the wisdom, or hopefully expectations, of the fans from day one, so we were hopefully way ahead rather than trying to catch up.
Toks Olagundoye: It was so fleshed out and so nuanced and there were so many details, we weren't lacking in anything. We were given so many gifts to work with, they really took care with making sure that the world of the show is very full and complete and complements where it comes from.
What would you say were some of the biggest creative challenges for you both finding the heart of your character and then bringing them to life through the voice work?
Harry Lloyd: Some of the challenges often with voice work is just technical because when you're in there and it's going well and if you find a problem where the scenes not working, you can kind of you start again or you can just attack that line. There's so many different technical ways that you can approach things, to address challenges that you've got in the recording.
The normal challenges that you get if I was playing Viktor in a film, you're taken so much better care of than in live-action stuff because you are one of 1000 people involved in every frame, you do the voice and they might take some of those facial expressions that you gave them, but they also might not, so you can really throw in all kinds of mistakes and all kinds of stuff and they want all of the human colors and messiness, because you're the only human person in charge of the performance.
What they do with the colors and the layers and the little tweaks and the facial expressions and how they set it in a context, the stuff that the audience will be reacting to, it's all taken care of, so actually, I felt very free to really mess it up and felt encouraged to do that, which is always a nice feeling.
Toks Olagundoye: I agree with that. I think with Mel, I was trying to walk a very fine line between making sure that she was strong, but not hard. I still wanted her to have a grace and sort of a soft quality to her and not make her a stereotypical hard woman. I really wanted to preserve her humanity and give her somewhere to go, so that line was sometimes a little complicated for me, but as Harry said, we were given a lot of freedom to play and try things and a lot of really good guidance.
Can either of you remember some of your favorite moments from production when you got to maybe improv a little bit with the characters during the recordings?
Toks Olagundoye: Every session was fun and every session I got to play.
Harry Lloyd: I'm trying to think of a specific bit because often you're on your own there, so that when you're trying to find something a bit funny or organic, or a little moment that is going to be in the background so you can supply some additional chat, that really relies on the chemistry you end up having with the people you're recording with, which when it's Alex [Yee] and Christian [Linke] and even different engineers, it's actually really easy.
You'd think sometimes, "I don't have any other actors around, I'm just here with these kind of technical people, it's gonna be a bit more mathematical," but it was a real hoot and we had ideas and they would laugh and they would unmute themselves after a take like, "Oh, that was actually really funny, we were loving it, let's try this."
It was like recording an album. It was all just quiet; it felt really organic and quite free-flowing when I thought it would have to be very expensive to make and I probably only got two hours and I gotta make sure I get my lines done because there's an animation deadline next week. We were saved from all of that, it was a real laugh.
I was talking with Ella Purnell and she was telling me the various forms of animation she got to work with while recording. What was it like for you both getting to see these full sequences as well as the pre-visualized artwork to record alongside?
Toks Olagundoye: Initially, for me, I just thought it was really cool and really well done. Then as we kept going, I remember the very last time that I recorded, I got really emotional because what I was watching was so beautiful and so well done. I just got really emotional about the fact that I get to do something so freaking cool. [Laughs] As it's grown and fine-tuned, it's gone from being like, "Oh, this is cool" to, "Oh my god, I can't believe I get to do this."
Harry Lloyd: It's super satisfying when the first time you record a scene, you get literally kind of pencil sketches and you know someone's basically done a rough moment of the character will be here and then they'll be here and you understand in those three seconds, he's walked across the room and you just have a basic shape.
Which is helpful to know, "This line, you're on the other side of the room, so I need to pitch it up a little bit," or, "Here, we're next to each other." But even with that, they even asked us about geography and while it was still organic, we weren't locked into anything. Bit by bit you, like a sculptor, you're just shaving away all the bits that are working till you're left with something that really sings and I remember seeing some of the later animations even while we were still recording it and having to say, "Guys this is stunning, just the shadows and the color."
It feels like a watercolor, but it's so digitally - I don't know how to describe it. They were like, "This is still 70 percent, maybe 60 percent of a finished polish, we haven't done the grade, we haven't done this," and I said, "I would watch that already." So I don't think I've seen a final of any of the episodes, so I'm as excited as anyone else.
Arcane premieres on Netflix on November 6 at 7 PM PST.
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