Who Plays Michael Kovak - (The Real Father Gary Thomas)
Colin O'Donoghue is an Irish actor and musician who was born and raised in Drogheda, County Louth. He initially attended Dundalk Grammar School and then The Gaiety School of Acting in Dublin; although at age 16, Colin went to Paris for a month to learn French.
He began acting in 2001, in the British television miniseries
'Rebel Heart' - starring James D'Arcy. Colin played Rowe in the first episode of the miniseries. In 2002, Colin played Norman Quested in the television movie
'Home For Christmas' - a role for which he won an Irish Film and Television Award For Best New Talent.
His early career was mainly split between theatre and television work in Ireland and the United Kingdom. In 2009, he appeared as Duke Phillip of Bavaria in an episode of season 3 of the
Showtime series
'The Tudors'. Colin actually made his Hollywood movie debut alongside Anthony Hopkins in the 2011 movie
The Rite. He had made his audition video for
The Rite in a friend's home studio in Drogheda and sent it to the United States.
In 2012, Colin O'Donoghue joined the second season of the hit
ABC series
'Once Upon a Time' when he was cast as Captain Hook/Killian Jones. His role originally started as a supporting character, until it was announced that Colin would be billed as a series regular beginning in the second half of the second season.
He also plays guitar and sings in a five-piece band from the east coast of Ireland. In 2003, he and a close friend Ronan McQuillan, formed the pop/rock band 'The Enemies' - and they released their self-titled debut album in 2011. In May of 2013, he announced that he was leaving the band due to the filming schedule of
'Once Upon a Time'.
Despite his success outside of Ireland, Colin has no plans to relocate to either Los Angeles or Vancouver, Canada where he is currently shooting
'Once Upon a Time'. He explained, “You don’t know what circumstances are going to come up, so it’s tough to make a decision like that and move somewhere for two or three years... Whatever happens, Drogheda will always be my home because it is where my friends and family are.” Colin is married to Helen O'Donoghue, and on August 1, 2013 the couple's son, Evan was born.
Who Plays Angeline Vargas - (The Real Matt Baglio)
Born in São Paulo, Brazil, Alice Braga's exposure to the world of acting began at a young age. Both her mother, Ana Braga, and aunt, Sônia Braga, are actresses; and young Alice would often accompany them to film sets. She began her own acting career by appearing in commercials and school plays. Her first commercial was for yogurt when she was eight years old. As a teenager she began pursuing roles in television and movies. She speaks fluent Portuguese, Spanish and English.
In 1998, Alice debuted in the Portuguese-language short
Trampolim, and then returned to her schooling. Her big break came in 2002, when she was cast as Angélica in the critically acclaimed film
City of God - for which she received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for the Cinema Brazil Grand Prize. Alice took some more time off and attended university while appearing in two well-regarded South American films - 2005's
Lower City and 2006's
Only God Knows - and the popular Brazilian television show
'Carandiru, Outras Historias'.
Alice Braga made her English-language movie debut in 2006, in a starring role alongside Brendan Fraser, Mos Def and Catalina Sandino Moreno in the independent film
Journey to the End of Night - which premiered at the
Tribeca Film Festival. In 2007, she was cast in the Will Smith blockbuster
I Am Legend. Alice Braga was also cast in the 2009 independent film
Crossing Over - alongside Harrison Ford, Ray Liotta and Ashley Judd; and was in the David Mamet film
Redbelt in 2008 as well.
In 2010, Alice starred in the science-fiction films
Repo Men and
Predators; in 2013, she starred as Frey Santiago in the dystopian science fiction thriller
Elysium. She is the sister of the actress and producer, Rita Moraes and the cousin of the director, Daniela Braga. Her nickname is Lili and she is an Aries.
My Review of the Movie Adaptation of Matt Baglio's The Rite: The Making of a Modern Exorcist:
To be perfectly honest, I've never actually read Matt Baglio's book - at least not yet, anyway; although I certainly have my eyes open to see whether I can obtain a copy very soon. According to Fr. Gary Thomas, around whom
The Rite: The Making of a Modern Exorcist is loosely based, "The book is all true. There is nothing in that book that is not true."
The Catholic Church does recognize demonic possession as real, and the Vatican does, in fact, offer classes on exorcism at its affiliated Pontifical Regina Apostolorum University in Rome. As a matter of fact, Fr. Gary Thomas and Matt Baglio met during one such exorcism class. As the only two Americans in attendance in the class, the men quickly became friends.
Fr. Thomas actually did seek out several exorcists to apprentice with during his nine-month sabbatical in Rome; deciding that it was not only important to learn about exorcisms, but to experience them as well. To that end, Fr. Thomas sought out and was subsequently apprenticed with Capuchin Father Carmine De Filippis; the priest on whom Anthony Hopkins' character is based. During their time together, Fr. Thomas witnessed approximately 80 exorcisms.
As with Colin O'Donoghue's character in the movie, Fr. Thomas worked for a time in a funeral home. While attending a funeral as a teenager, Gary was approached by one of the owners and asked if he wanted to work there part time. At the age of 14, he accepted employment and began working odd jobs at the Nauman Lincoln Roos mortuary.
While Fr. Thomas wasn't always a man of the cloth, he has always considered it as a personal calling. After graduating from high school, he went on to study mortuary science in university and worked in the funeral home business until the age of 25 - when he enrolled at St. Patrick's Seminary. Five years years later he became an ordained Catholic priest. Unlike Colin O'Donoghue's character in the movie, Fr. Thomas never experienced a crisis of faith as a seminarian, and he was considerably older than Michael Kovak when he began his training in Rome (in his mid-50s).
According to Fr. Thomas, "A demon doesn't show up. He has to be invited in. The involvement in pagan, satanic, or occult practices are the classical ways." While somewhat less common, it is understood that others can invite them (demons) in without your participation, such as by cursing or having a past family member promise a child to the devil.
Although Fr. Thomas has never witnessed anyone vomit anything unusual during an exorcism - Father Gabriele Amorth, the Vatican's chief exorcist, with more than 70,000 exorcisms to his name, and who was Fr. De Filippis' own mentor - has witnessed possessed people vomit numerous foreign objects: from black nails, to shards of glass and even radio equipment parts. Fr. Carmine De Filippis was present during an exorcism where the possessed woman vomited a live black frog.
I think that the actors were perfectly cast for the roles they played. Anthony Hopkins is renowned for his dedicated preparation for roles. He has stated in interviews, that once he is committed to a project, he will go over his lines as many times as is needed (sometimes upwards of 200) until the lines sound natural to him, so that he can "do it without thinking". This leads to an almost casual style of delivery that belies the amount of groundwork done beforehand.
This was especially evident in
The Rite - in the scene where Michael Kovak returns to Fr. Lucas' home, and finds distinct evidence of demonic possession. When Michael asks Fr. Lucas if he's alright, the 'presence' claims that Fr. Lucas isn't in residence. Anthony Hopkins sounds so perfectly reasonable and rational during their subsequent conversation, that the scene is all the more frightening when the demon does eventually show itself.
The actress who played Rosaria - Marta Gastini - was 20 years old when she was cast in
The Rite, and I think she was wonderful in the part. She was so innocent-looking, that sometimes I forgot that Rosaria was actually possessed - until she contorted her body or said something particularly vile.
Overall, I would give
The Rite a definite
A! and I look forward to getting my hands on a copy of
The Rite: The Making of a Modern Exorcist by Matt Baglio as soon as possible.
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