Set 10,000 years before the events of Denis Villeneuve’s Dune, the recently released Dune: Prophecy unravels the formative years of the elusive Bene Gesserit, a powerful sisterhood that extends its social, political, and religious influence across the galaxy. In the series, Faoileann Cunningham and Aoife Hinds play young acolytes undergoing the rigorous training of the Bene Gesserit to become a Reverend Mother. On how they sifted through the extremely dense characterisation of a Bene Gesserit member to bring out the individuality of their respective characters, the actors revealed that multiple factors were involved. Faoileann Cunningham, who plays Sister Jen, says, “The extent of background work done by the writers and showrunners helped us a lot. A lot of the training we underwent to prepare for the character helped us as well. It was a case of life imitating art as the level of skill we managed to imbibe also helped define the character.” She then adds, “I don’t think Bene Gesserit are a homogenised group. Moreover, we are seeing the formative years of the sisterhood and they are yet to become the streamlined, extremely efficient versions we see in the films.”
Aoife Hinds, who plays Sister Emelin points to the individuality of each actor and how that inadvertently pours into their respective characters. “If the roles had been reversed, if Faoileann had played Emeline and if I had played Jen, it would be a completely different interpretation of the characters,” she says. Expanding on the preparation for the series, the actor says, “We trained to fight every day. There is also a type of meditation in Dune called the Prana Bindu, which we practised with our movement coach." Cunningham adds, “We had two weeks of preparation before filming so we entered into the sets with a shared physical language. Some days, some of the actors will have a slightly different version of the same choreography and it helped set up the dynamic between the characters, in terms of the hierarchies within the Bene Gesserit school. Some day, I would just walk in and see hundreds of actors practising Prana Bindu.”
While it is part of a successful franchise, Dune: Prophecy is starkly different from Denis Villenueve’s Dune films since it takes place thousands of years before the films and the main characters are not directly connected to the proceedings of the films. However, Cunningham feels that the audience would still connect with the series because “It is not a separate thing but it is still its own thing.” She says, “Sometimes, I pick up on tiny details and realise that a particular character in the series could potentially become a part of a prominent lineage in the films and that excites me.” Aoife Hinds points out how the series offers something for both the Dune fans and others as well. “For the Dune fans, this could be an origin story, you get the beginning of the feud between the Atreides and Harkonnens and then you also have new stories and new characters for a new set of audience,” she says. Dune: Prophecy is currently streaming on JioCinema Premium, available in seven languages.