Netflix’s All the Light We Cannot See Series Adds Mark Ruffalo & Hugh Laurie

January 10, 2022

According to Deadline, Golden Globe winners Mark Ruffalo and Hugh Laurie have officially signed on to star in Netflix’s forthcoming limited series adaptation of All the Light We Cannot See, based on Anthony Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name. They will be joining newcomer Aria Mia Loberti, who has been tapped in a worldwide casting search for the leading role.

Ruffalo is set to portray Daniel LeBlanc, the father of Loberti’s Marie-Laure, while Laurie will be portraying war hero Etienne LeBlanc. Their character descriptions are listed below:

Ruffalo’s Daniel – He is a principal locksmith at the Museum of Natural History in Paris, described as caring and clever. Daniel is determined to give his blind teenage daughter as much independence as he can while also protecting her – and the secret gem they carry – from Nazi occupation.
Laurie’s Etienne – is an eccentric and reclusive World War I hero suffering from PTSD. Etienne is a nervous shut-in who records clandestine radio broadcasts as part of the French Resistance.

All the Light We Cannot See will center around a blind teenager who comes across Werner, a German soldier, as they both struggle to survive the chaos of an occupied France during World War II. It will be directed by Shawn Levy from a screenplay written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight.

Pick up a copy of the novel here!

The casting of Loberti comes after the woman decided to audition for the role after she found out that they were looking for blind or low-vision actresses. She is a current Ph.D. student in Rhetoric at Pennsylvania State University and a former United Nations Youth Delegate, who had no formal acting training, but was still able to bagged her first-ever acting role beating thousands of submissions.

All the Light We Cannot See will be executive produced by Levy, Knight Dan Levine, and Josh Barry for 21 Laps Entertainment. Joe Strechay, who previously worked with Apple TV+’s See series, has been enlisted as an associate producer and a Blindness and Accessibility consultant.