The FX’s horror-drama series The Strain, kicked off its fourth and final season on July 16th. We spoke with actor Cas Anvar, who plays Sanjay Desai and will be a returning character in season 4 after debuting in season 3.
The Strain is the creation of Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan, based on their novel trilogy of the same name, and is currently the highest-rated sci-fi show on FX.
HB: For those not familiar with the show, can you tell us a little about the overall premise of The Strain?
Cas Anvar: The Strain is based on Del Toro’s fantastic series of novels about a culture–or race–of creatures created by a fusion of a parasite and disease that combines in humans and becomes a host, which turns people into vampires. And they’re connected to the main vampire, The Master, and his mission is to dominate the planet and create a new era of vampires running things and reshaping the world into the view he has.
It’s a very interesting take on vampire mythology. These creatures are very organized and methodical and structured in a way that is different than what you usually see, where they’re very gothic and dangerous and in some ways primitive. But this is realistic. They are called the Strigoi, and it’s a nice take on mythology and a fresh approach.
HB: I saw that Guillermo del Toro is one of the creators and executive producers, and his work is extremely prolific. We’re big fans of his over here at HorrorBuzz! Were you a fan of his work before coming on to the show?
CA: Oh yeah. Hellboy, Pan’s Labyrinth, they’re all gorgeous stories, and he’s a masterful storyteller. He’s able to take a dark approach to any material he approaches and turn it into this visual feast. There’s the Hellboy world that he created from the book, and Pan’s world as an original concept, it was like a dark telling of Alice in Wonderland.
HB: So your character appeared in season 3 and he’s now returning for season 4. Tell us a bit about your character, and what is his role in this new season?
CA: Sanjay is one of most interesting characters I’ve played—they based him on real people that existed on WWII that were collaborators with Nazis. When they interviewed these people 50 years later, these people who collaborated with Nazis and those who betrayed their own kind, they couldn’t admit their wrongdoing or take responsibility because they could rationalize that they were somehow doing good. In their minds they were saving people when in reality, they were sending people to their own death, and they just figured out way to justify it.
Sanjay is based on that world. He’s a very self-centered, selfish individual who will do whatever it takes to survive. He cares about playing for the winning team but doesn’t see himself that way, only as a winner and as smart. We have some people in our current political system who will do or say whatever they have to in order to get their way, even if it means lying and damaging other people. So Sanjay is a powerful and important character who represents what’s going on today.
HB: What do you believe the inspiration was for this show, and do you have your own interpretation of it?
CA: Both shows I’m in [The Expanse and The Strain] are very socio-political. They were written before the current administration took over in the US so it’s not exactly commenting on what’s going on now, but it’s definitely commenting on the possibilities of what COULD happen. You’re dealing with corruption and power and abuse of information and the wrongful corruption of information in the media, and dealing with entire groups of people that are self-serving and out for own interests, no matter the cost. The running theme in both shows is “we will do whatever’s necessary to achieve our ends whatever the cost, even if self destructive.”
It’s important in both shows. The Strain shows what could happen to society when we don’t actually allow ourselves to believe that something is happening right in front of us, and yet we refuse to see it.
We all know what happened 60 years ago and we refused to see it. They allowed the systems to be put in place and soon it was too late, and this can easily be compared to whats happening now. We’re standing here slack-jawed and the things we hear are unbelievable. It’s mind-blowing to hear what’s happening now, we refuse to actually know and say, “oh my god, this is insane, we’ve made a mistake.” That’s a lot of what’s going on in this show, it’s there to shake people up. If you don’t stand up and use your voice, you’ll deal with the consequences and they become a disease that’s hard to get rid of.
HB: Couldn’t agree more, and it’s so cool how something that seems to unrealistic actually reflects much of reality. What can we expect to see in season 4?
CA: It’s the last season, which is pretty exciting because all bets are off. We honor the characters and the story but there really are no restrictions, we just get to tell the best story we can.
The end of season 3 left everybody hanging, you can’t just ignore what happened. They’ll deal with that, and there will be huge changes and shifts in the world that The Strain audience is used to. Everybody is gonna go through a major shift at the top of the season and then get on the rollercoaster and ride it to the end. It’s the most exciting season of the series.
HB: We can’t wait! Do you have any good stories from working on set?
CA: It was a hoot to go to New York to shoot the end of season 3, Richard [Sammel] and I spent the day on a ferry to go to Ellis Island. There was one thing in season 4, it was a restaurant scene. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen The Matrix, but there’s this one scene where one of characters is eating steak and I always loved that scene, everything about it was so great and I got to do a similar scene. But I didn’t realize how many times I’d have to take bites of steak and it was right before lunch. I OD’d on steak and I had to swallow the steak every single time. I started off making it this big, juicy piece and then as it went on, I kept asking prop guy to cut it smaller. It was an interesting experience dealing with food in an acting scene that a lot of people don’t think about.
So I’m gonna try and watch the premiere on Sunday. I don’t know if there’s gonna be live tweeting but I’m usually available for stuff like that. I encourage my fans to tune in because it’s gonna be a roller coaster. Also, hang in there till February and we’ll give you season 3 of The Expanse.
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If you’d like to see Anvar in action as Sanjay Desai, be sure to tune in to the series finale of The Strain on Sunday, July 16th on FX.