At this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, the cast and creators of Revival descended on the convention to tease what’s ahead for the SYFY series that has everyone asking, What happens when the dead come back, but don’t act like zombies? In the pressroom, Revival stars David James Elliott (Sheriff Wayne Cypress) and Andy McQueen (Dr. Ibrahim Ramin) reflected on what it’s like portraying two men caught in the emotional and moral crossfire of the Reviver phenomenon.
For David James Elliott, who plays the stoic town sheriff, Season 1 has been a humbling journey for Wayne Cypress, a man known for his rigid black and white views, suddenly confronted with a devastating truth: his daughter Em is one of them. “It’s a lot when you find that your daughter dies… your reasoning goes out the window,” Elliott said. “It threw a wrench in all my arguments… that whole house of cards comes down.”
Wayne’s struggle with identity and ideology continues to unravel as the season progresses. Elliott shared that fans will see “his soft, white underbelly” exposed, especially as revelations challenge the way Wayne views his daughters. “Em’s the last,” he said, visibly moved. “She’s always been someone that needed heavy protection… and then I find out she’s one of them. Devastating.”
McQueen, who plays Ibrahim, was quick to praise Elliott’s ability to guide Wayne into morally murky waters. “You sort of travel into the gray area,” McQueen said. “It’s great to see Wayne shift his perspective, because now he’s directly involved.”
That same moral uncertainty runs deep through Ibrahim’s storyline as well. A man of science and faith, Ibrahim begins the series grounded in logic but is increasingly tested, especially by his connection to Dana. “Everything he does is driven by his resolve to save Dana and to always be on her side,” McQueen said. “They’re all traveling this morally gray area they’ve never traveled before, which is cool to see… it builds that ensemble.”
Filming the show presented its own set of real-world challenges. Elliott recalled being “really sick for two weeks” while shooting some of his most emotional scenes, and losing his voice at one point. Add to that the harsh weather in the Canadian location, hot when they were in winter coats, cold when those same coats didn’t quite hold up, and it’s clear the cast went through the wringer.
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And then there’s the alien. Neither actor had the luxury of seeing the creature during filming, relying instead on lights, props, or “green screen guesstimations.” McQueen noted that the show didn’t film in chronological order, making it even harder to ground emotionally intense scenes. “Our first scene was the hospital scene in Episode 5,” he said. “You get to Episode 2 later and go, damn, I wish I’d known this before, I would’ve made a different choice.”
Elliott added that they shot “five episodes at a time,” which meant constantly second-guessing what their characters knew when. One particularly jarring moment? Realizing on his last day of filming, that Wayne’s discovery of Em being a Reviver hadn’t yet been captured. “We’re both like, wait a minute, what? He just finds out now?”
For McQueen, one of the most emotional moments came in Episode 6, when Ibrahim watches Jordan get taken by the Passenger. With nothing more than a stand-in prop and a single tear running down his cheek, he delivered a gut-punch of a reaction. “It was a mixture of playing a bunch of tapes,” he said. “Flora [who plays Jordan] was there on the other side, and she’s so authentic, it really helped.” Director Samir Rehem, a friend of McQueen’s, created a relaxed space to experiment. “We just did a ‘f*** it tape,’” he said, laughing. “Best time.”
Whether trudging through emotional collapse or moral evolution, both actors clearly respect the layered humanity of their characters. “All our beliefs are being challenged,” Elliott said, and in Revival, that’s the whole point.
Revival airs Thursdays at 10/9c on SYFY and stream the following week on Peacock.
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