Like his Night Swim character, Wyatt Russell (The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters) was a former athlete, one of the reasons director Bryce McGuire wanted him for the role of former baseball pro Ray Waller.
For the actor, being able to draw on his own experience as an athlete definitely helped his performance. “There are aspects of this character that obviously I’ve felt before, or seen in people I know, where you’re sort of losing your ability and sense of identity to injury,” says Russell, who played hockey on the amateur and professional levels for six years, until injuries forced him to quit. “I know the feeling of wanting to do anything, even if it’s detrimental to yourself or your family, to keep playing; it’s a hard drug to let go of. There was that element of it that I know Bryce wanted, and I was able to do that because I had lived aspects of that life.”
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