Lennie James gives flawed men weight without making them easy to approve of. We rate his grounded acting and would look beyond the supporting film roles to the television dramas he has helped put on the page.
Fi1m perspective
In Mufasa: The Lion King (2024), Obasi barely looks at the orphaned cub. Lennie James supplies his voice, and Barry Jenkins gives that refusal of attention room to register among the photoreal animals. We felt for the cub because the slight is so ordinary: an adult will not acknowledge him. It is a useful introduction to James's territory, the flawed man whose authority makes somebody else's life harder. But an animated character's effect cannot be credited to the voice alone.
Snatch (2000) brought him wider notice as Sol in Guy Ritchie's well-chosen ensemble. Its pace and comic plotting make it worth an evening, despite the ethnic caricatures and recycled gangland swagger. Our enthusiasm there belongs to the cast working together. James's own writing provides a reason to look further: he also wrote and starred in Storm Damage (2000).
Television gave him a leading role as DCI Tony Gates in the first series of Line of Duty (2012). As Morgan Jones, he worked across The Walking Dead (2010–2018) and Fear the Walking Dead (2018–2023), also directing episodes of the latter. Flawed authority figures and survivors suit his grounded acting. We find him persuasive when a man's position gives us reasons to distrust him without making him simple to dismiss.
Save Me (2018–2020), which he created and led as Nelly Rowe, makes the writing central again. Alongside Storm Damage, it gives us reason to regard James as more than a dependable casting choice. His interest in flawed and marginalised characters extends to making the dramas in which they appear. Mr Loverman (2024) gives him another television lead as Barrington Walker.
The limitation in Mufasa is that Mads Mikkelsen's Kiros is the only lion whose voice makes the face seem to think. James is part of the film's better early stretch, but we would not recommend it on his performance alone. The forgettable songs and interruptions from the framing story are problems an actor cannot solve. For James, we would begin with the television work he has written.
Biography
Lennie James is a British actor and writer. Born in Nottingham in 1965, he trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, graduating in 1988.
He is known for playing Morgan Jones in the television series The Walking Dead (2010–2018) and its spin-off Fear the Walking Dead (2018–2023), and for his film roles as Sol in Snatch (2000) and Mister Cotton in Blade Runner 2049 (2017). He voiced Obasi in Mufasa: The Lion King (2024). James has also appeared in Line of Duty (2012) and created the series Save Me (2018–2020). He has received BAFTA awards.
