Everyone’s Favorite Hot Priest, ‘Fleabag’ Actor Andrew Scott, Will Star In A ‘Talented Mr. Ripley’ Show

Phoebe Waller-Bridge may have just won three Emmys for Fleabag, but its creator-writer-star isn’t the show’s only draw. The second (and probably final) series found our troubled anti-heroine falling for a pastor played by Sherlock’s Andrew Scott, a character who’s only credited as “Priest” but whom most of the internet has decided should be called “Hot Priest.” The show made the already beloved Irish actor even moreso, and it’s even already starting to pay off: While Waller-Bridge will make gobs of money creating content for Amazon, Scott, as per The Hollywood Reporter, is about to become the latest actor to play iconic crime conman and casual serial murderer Tom Ripley.

Perhaps you know Ripley best from the high-toned 1999 thriller The Talented Mr. Ripley, with Matt Damon offing a never more golden Jude Law so he can steal his riches. That hit was adapted from the first in a line of twisty — and frequently homoerotic — Ripley novels by Patricia Highsmith, also of Strangers on a Train and The Price of Salt, which most people know by its 2015 film adaptation, Carol. Highsmith wrote four subsequent Ripley novels, which found him always eluding capture from other, even slimier schemes.

Highsmith’s Ripley books have inspired numerous other film adaptations, each starring different actors as its amoral grifter, from Alain Delon (1960’s Purple Noon) to Dennis Hopper (1977’s The American Friend) to John Malkovich (2002’s Ripley’s Game) to Barry Pepper (2005’s Ripley Under Ground).

When he stars on the show, to be called simply Ripley, only will Scott be joining august company, he’ll have a lot to work with — five bloody, page-turning novels that could easily fuel a season each. But most importantly, Scott is one of the internet’s current boyfriends, meaning people on social media were stoked to hear they’ll be seeing more of their favorite hot priest — yes, one even hotter than Matthew McConaughey in Contact.

(Via THR)

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