In Francis Lawrence’s The Long Walk, the Major (Mark Hamill) supervises a group of young men, each selected as the best representative of their state, as they compete for glory and the granting of a wish by walking until they can’t anymore – and until they’re the last one standing.
Awards Buzz spoke with casting director Rich Delia about the ambitious task of finding the right actors, led by Cooper Hoffman and David Jonsson, for all these roles. It’s been an extremely busy year for Delia, whose credits in 2025 alone also include horror projects The Monkey, Final Destination: Bloodlines, The Parenting, and IT: Welcome to Derry, action films G20 and Playdate, and sequel Now You See Me: Now You Don’t. On this film’s genre and his approach to it, Delia shared:
“I think a lot of people, because the film is Stephen King, some people think, oh, this must be a horror film. I’ve had the great chance and benefit in my career to work on several Stephen King adaptations, and some of them are straight horror. But I think that I’ve always viewed The Long Walk as a film about humanity. To me, it’s really a film about connection and friendship and brotherhood and humanity. Even though there are horrific things happening in the film, I never really viewed it as such. Whenever I’m approaching a film, whether it’s a genre film or any kind of film, a drama, a comedy, a musical, a thriller – I always approach a film from character, because if I can fall in love with characters or get frustrated by characters, or feel for a character, get annoyed by a character, then I feel like I can advocate for those characters and try to find the best actors to play them because I trust that audiences will be moved by them as well.”
Watch the video above to hear about casting an almost entirely male ensemble (save for the wonderful Judy Greer), Hamill playing a villain, and fitting every piece into place.
The Long Walk is currently streaming on VOD.
