Take a Behind-the-Scenes Look at Al Pacino’s First TV Series, ‘Hunters’ — Watch!
When choosing his first television series, it’s not really surprising that, A), Al Pacino would choose to go with one of the streaming services and that, B), it would be on a show with a purpose, dealing with weighty material as is the case with the Amazon Prime show, Hunters.
The setting is New York City in 1977, the focus on a team of Nazi Hunters who have uncovered the truth: hundreds of escaped Nazis are living in America. In response, they set out on what becomes a bloody quest for vengeance and justice, but what they discover along the way is a conspiracy that’s far-reaching involving new genocidal plans of the Nazis.
As to how Pacino became a part of the series, showrunner David Weil tells AVClub.com, “His agent read the script and called us and was, like, ‘I think Al might like this. I think there is something in this that Al really will respond to.’ It was incredibly surreal. And then we had four or five meetings with him before he officially signed on.”
Adds fellow showrunner Nikki Toscano, “The first meeting was just him making sure that we were down-to-earth people, because he’s very much down-to-earth himself. He is an incredibly lovely and generous man of spirit, of his time, of his craft, and it was just so unique to see him come in and do what he did with this role. And in a way that I could’ve never imagined.”
“He lived the role for the eight months that we shot this,” notes David. “He keep the accent off-camera, he devotes all of his time and being to ensuring the authenticity of this person and exploring depths and dimensions about him that we couldn’t even imagine.”
Other cast members include Logan Lerman, Jerrika Hinton, Lena Olin, Josh Radnor, Carol Kane and Saul Rubinek.
Hunters begins streaming on Amazon February 21.
Listen on Spotify to Closer Classic Film and TV as we celebrate Classic TV with behind the scenes coverage, celebrity interviews, news and much more!
