Is the Gladiator sequel a good idea?

As Ridley Scott’s ‘Gladiator 2’, starring Paul Mescal, is given a release date for next year, Geoffrey Macnab questions whether the director can still harness the anarchic energy of the original

Russell Crowe in Ridley Scott’s ‘Gladiator’ in 2000 (Dreamworks/Universal/Kobal/Shutterstock)

There is only a year and a half to wait until Normal People and Aftersun’s Paul Mescal is due to stride out into the Colosseum in his thongs, plumed helmet, leather wrist bands, and with his shield and short sword. The strapping, Oscar-nominated Irish actor is to star in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator 2, which this week was given a release date of 22 November 2024 by Paramount Studios. After all the gossip and speculation about a possible sequel over the last decade, this confirms that the follow-up to the Oscar-winning hit in 2000 will indeed be going ahead. 

Why Mescal? The 27-year-old actor, who became a heartthrob after the sex scenes in Normal People, isn’t at first glance an obvious choice to fill Russell Crowe’s sandals 23 years later. He’s a gentler, more sensitive screen presence than the hell-raising Crowe was at the same age.

Reviewers, though, have written of the “fierce and dangerous energy” Mescal is bringing to his current stage role as Stanley Kowalski in the new Almeida production of Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire – soon to transfer to the West End. He has been described as “terrifying”, “brilliantly brutal” and “feral”, so perhaps he has some of Crowe’s rabid dog quality after all for the role of Lucius, the son of Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) – Crowe’s lover in the first film.