“No I can’t look different off-camera”: Netflix’s Grand Fumble Was Letting Henry Cavill Go When He Was Ready to Sacrifice His Eyesight to Nail The Witcher Role

There is very little that Henry Cavill was not willing to do – or sacrifice, for that matter – for Netflix’s live-action adaptation of The Witcher. The fantasy series adapted from Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski’s literary series was one of the few rare privileges awarded to the actor before his attachment was unceremoniously and tragically cut short. But that saga has already been ranted about extensively.

The primary reason why Cavill is still so heavily involved in the discourse surrounding The Witcher can be chalked up to fan nostalgia. Only a handful of actors in the history of Hollywood have been so aware, immersed, and informed about the role that they were destined to play. Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool comes to mind, the other being Cavill as Geralt of Rivia.

Henry Cavill Lets Out the Nerd in Him for The Witcher

After watching the pure and unadulterated beauty of Henry Cavill in his role as the White Wolf, any doubt regarding his love for the source material goes straight out the window. Fans were instead left to marvel at the serendipity of how all the right elements came together at just the right time to make The Witcher a reality.

Henry Cavill, a devout fan of high fantasy since his childhood who grew up to become an ardent and obsessive video game player and an overall nerd, never gave up or hid away his hobby with the rise of his career in Hollywood. There couldn’t have been a more famous name than the actor, who was coming off of his Superman glory, to actively beg for the lead role in the Netflix production.

For Cavill, The Witcher was a dream come true. For the audience, he was the cherry on top of the cake. His love and enthusiasm for the lead character, Sapkowski’s novels, and the video game adaptations came out in his posture, voice, mannerisms, every little crack in expression, fighting stance, and even the intonations in his dialogue delivery as Geralt. Cavill was as breathtaking as the Butcher of Blaviken as he was in his arc as the White Wolf.

In fact, his attention to detail stretched so far that Cavill admitted, “I’d go stand out in the rain. Sometimes I’d roll around in puddles. I would just try and get as much of the world on me, so this character looked like he had lived within it.”

In an interview with Vanity Fair, he revealed the lengths he went to in order to provide a faithful depiction of the Witcher on-screen. Talking about the character’s signature mutated yellow eyes and the contacts he wore to accurately portray it, the actor recalled a certain problematic aspect of filming:

My eye technician found me huddled in the shade and said, ‘I’m taking the contacts out.’ And I said, ‘No I can’t look different off-camera or when the other actors are looking at me. It’s going to be more difficult for them. They’re accustomed [to] this look, and it’s all part of the design of the character so they have something to react to.’

She said, ‘I don’t care. I’m taking the contacts out because you’re going to damage your eyes. I’m doing it. Otherwise I’m stopping shooting.’ I was like, ‘Okay, okay, okay.’ Took the contacts out. When we went back to Budapest, she took me in to have my eyes checked.

It turned out that whatever the dust was, volcanic, it ended up scratching my eye, because it got behind the contacts and was just rubbing there for however long. It took about, I want to say three weeks to heal, and then the contacts were back in.

In an age where video game adaptations are being developed in plenty although most fail to hit the mark, The Witcher was a shining beacon of how to get the formula right. Henry Cavill was a key ingredient in that recipe and Netflix let him walk away due to irreconcilable studio politics.

Toss a Coin to Your Witcher; Oh, Valley of Plenty

To this day, perhaps one of the greatest acts of injustice carried out during the era of streaming was allowing the bridge to burn between Henry Cavill and The Witcher production team. The controversial move caused an uproar even greater than Netflix’s unwarranted culling of 5 whole projects a week after the actors’ strike.

In the months that followed, this continuing trend of canceling unfinished shows led to the launch of a petition seeking more transparency (between the streamer and its paying subscribers) into Netflix’s decision-making process.

The tragedy of The Witcher, however, was compounded by much more than just the end of a mutually beneficial relationship. Henry Cavill had personally championed the project and campaigned for his own hiring as the lead because of his history and familiarity with the game and his love for the IP.

The actor’s hands-on involvement in not just the character but also Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels ensured that the audience was treated to a full-course meal rather than a superficial rendering of the source material and its gaming world. Cavill was not just a fanboy but a proper fanatic who respected and captured the essence of his character more accurately than anyone else in his place could.

In the end, Netflix’s Valley of Plenty abandoned its source-accurate Witcher for a more compliant Liam Hemsworth after the production’s alleged fallout with Cavill over deviation from the source material. With three seasons now complete, the younger Hemsworth brother is scheduled to star in the titular role and fill in the very large shoes left behind by his predecessor from Season 4.

The Witcher Seasons 1 to 3 are currently streaming on Netflix.