ComingSoon Editor-in-Chief Tyler Treese spoke with Eric creator and writer Abi Morgan and star McKinley Belcher III about the upcoming Netflix series. The six-part thriller drama premieres on May 30, 2024, and also stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Gaby Hoffman, Dan Fogler, and Clarke Peters.
“Set in 1980s New York, Eric is a new emotional thriller from Abi Morgan following the desperate search of a father when his nine-year-old son disappears one morning on the way to school. Vincent, one of New York’s leading puppeteers and creator of the hugely popular children’s television show, ‘Good Day Sunshine,’ struggles to cope with the loss of his son, Edgar, becoming increasingly distressed and volatile,” says the synopsis. “Full of self-loathing and guilt around Edgar’s disappearance, he clings to his son’s drawings of a blue monster puppet, Eric, convinced that if he can get Eric on TV then Edgar will come home. As Vincent’s progressively destructive behavior alienates his family, his work colleagues, and the detectives trying to help him, it’s Eric, a delusion of necessity, who becomes his only ally in the pursuit to bring his son home.”
Tyler Treese: Abi, I love the design of Eric. How did you come up with the design of the puppet? Was there a lot of iterations?
Abi Morgan: Well, I think in the script, it’s like Eric is a seven-foot blue puppet. There’s very little description. So it was really in the hands of Lucy Forbes, the director who we had the initial conversations with around how he should look. He went through many iterations, and he was probably the most talked about character in the entire series, if I’m honest. So there were lots of different variations, which colorway should his coat be, should he have a horn, shouldn’t he have horns, should he have teeth?
But what is interesting about Eric is that he’s built of things that Edgar’s kind of magpie-like taken from life. So he’s got his cat’s tail, he’s got the chevrons on the fur is matching the mink of his grandmother’s jacket. He’s got the actual pupils. The pupil design of the Eric Monster is actually based on Benedict Cumberbatch’s eyes. So it’s a photograph of that copy of his eye color. So there were lots of beautiful details that were really built and implemented by Lucy Forbes and Alex Holmes, the fantastic designer. But key to that was Stitches and Glue, who built the puppet, and they were just incredible in really responding to all the various iterations and responses of the kind of creative team who were all asking for changes throughout.
McKinley, I loved your performance in the show. I thought your character was very interesting because, in a lot of ways, you’re kind of like the conscience of the show. There’s so much going wrong, and you’re this one detective who’s really trying to do right by this community and find this kid. What did you really connect with for the character?
McKinley Belcher III: I really connected to… I think he’s an empath at heart, and I think that’s a way that I walk through the world. The sort of obvious thing is that he’s black and queer, and I am black and queer, but it was really exciting to get to portray a man who was sort of walking through six episodes and he’s sort of stepping into his power along the journey and helping people in the process of doing that. [He’s] changing the world that’s around him in a way that he feels is necessary, and that’s satisfying.
I’m really excited that the show sort of gets to share the journey of what it would’ve felt like to walk through the AIDS epidemic in the eighties. To watch him and William sort of love on each other, and then to watch him mourn him while he’s still there and ultimately after he’s potentially not. I think it’s both beautiful and honors the journey that many people had in real life.
Disclosure: Thanks to Abi Morgan and McKinley Belcher III for talking to us about Eric.