GAME OF LIFE AND DEATH

WHEN channelled correctly, Glen Powell believes anger can become a superpower.

- By YOLANTHE FAWEHINMI

ASSASSIN: Lee Pace as Evan McCone

The Golden Globe Award nominee has put this theory to the test as working-class dad Ben Richards, in his new dystopian action thriller The Running Man, adapted from Stephen King’s novel of the same name.

It was first published in 1982 under the American author's pseudonym Richard Bachman and later reprinted under King’s own name in 1985.

“I think anger, any emotion by the way, if harnessed correctly, is powerful,” says 37-year-old Glen.

“Emotions are there for a reason. I think it's when it’s unbridled, when it’s not channelled correctly, that’s where we get into trouble.

“The Running Man is about that anger being a superpower, it’s anger and frustration for other people and representing something and showing up for your whole community, showing up for humanity, rather than just the people closest to you.”

The premise of the story is that Ben feels frustrated by life and money problems and plans to sign up for a game show to try to make some cash in order to pay for medicine for his daughter.

“He ends up signing up for an unwinnable game show in which it’s life or death, where the entire world is hunting him,” explains Glen, who also starred in Top Gun: Maverick.

In a near-future society set in a dystopian United States in 2025, The Running Man is the top-rated deadly TV competition show on a channel run by the Network - a government-controlled media corporation.