Why Carrie Marked The 'Most Exhaustive And Difficult Casting Experience' Of Mike Flanagan's Career

Several different actors have played Carrie White, the bullied telekinetic girl at the center of Stephen King's "Carrie." But unquestionably the most memorable of the group has been Sissy Spacek, who played the role in Brian De Palma's 1976 adaptation. Spacek brought a haunted, ethereal quality to the role, playing Carrie as a painfully shy young woman with almost no social skills to speak off. This makes her eventual turn at the end, where she snaps and kills her cruel classmates at prom, all the more effective.

It's one of the most iconic performances in horror movie history, and stepping into Carrie's bloody prom dress after Spacek was no doubt a daunting prospect. Mike Flanagan is the latest to adapt "Carrie," this time in the form of a Prime Video series (read our review here). His take on the story is considerably different than King's novel and De Palma's film. Which meant he had to find a very different type of Carrie. Luckily, the production found Summer H. Howell, who is fantastic in the series. But casting Howell was no easy feat. As Flanagan told me during an exclusive interview, finding the new Carrie was the "most exhaustive and difficult casting experience" of his career.

Howell and Flanagan's version of Carrie is still a shy, bullied girl with powers. But Howell brings a surprising warmth to the role, playing Carrie as someone ready to embrace the outside world in a way Spacek's Carrie never was. But first, Flanagan and his team had to find the right actress. He old me they looked at "more than 1400 actresses" before finding Howell, adding:

"What we were looking for was a Carrie we'd never experienced before. We were looking for someone who was curious and earnest and kind and eager and utterly unspoiled by our world and our society, but we wanted her also not to appear to be naive. Her naivety, if she had any, came from the fact that she wasn't informed, that she wasn't given context to what was happening around her, but that she had an enormous emotional intelligence, an intuitive kindness, and a hidden reserve of power in who she is."

According to Flangan, Howell "embodied that in a way that made us simultaneously amazed by the layers of her, but also determined to protect her from the world." He added that her performance "defined the show," and I think he's right. This new "Carrie" wouldn't work without Howell's memorable performance.