It: Welcome to Derry star Jordan Adepo says his character in the new Stephen King spin-off series is very different from his 3 Body Problem scientist.
"Leroy's incredibly ambitious and very driven and career-driven and family-driven, but I think Saul's literally the exact opposite, at least from what you've seen from the first season," Adepo explained at an NYCC roundtable attended by GamesRadar+. "It was great to get to play Leroy because I filmed Derry after I finished the first season. And so before I went back to the second season [of 3 Body Problem], which we're doing now, I got to play Leroy."
Welcome to Derry takes place in 1962, where Leroy Hanlon (Adepo), a Major in the US Air Force, his wife Charlotte (Taylour Paige), and son Will (Blake Cameron James) are stationed in Maine amid the Cold War. During the It: Welcome to Derry panel at NYCC, Adepo explained that a Black man in the Air Force during that time had to be "exceptional" and at the top of his class. This is more or less the polar opposite of Dr. Saul Durand on 3 Body Problem, who spends most of season 1 sleeping around and more or less ignoring the fact that an alien invasion is imminent.
"It was great: a chance to play somebody that I relate to a bit more," the actor continued. "It was just a great exercise again to get to try to play someone who I imagined or relates a lot to my father, him being in the Air Force and raising me and my brother and being married to my mom, marrying her in England, and moving to the States. So it was a nice exercise to try to connect to his younger self."
Leroy Hanlon is the grandfather of Losers Club member Mike Hanlon, who is played by Chosen Jacobs in It and Isaiah Mustafa in It: Chapter 2. Welcome to Derry is based on Mike's extensive research into Derry, which aims to explore the true origins of Pennywise the Dancing Clown (and his false human persona, Bob Gray). NYCC attendees were treated to not one, but two scenes in which Leroy encounters Pennywise in the sewers...and it goes just about as well as you think it might.
It: Welcome to Derry hits HBO Max on October 26. For more, check out our guide to all of the upcoming Stephen King movies and shows you need to know about.
