With his debut performance as Spike in 28 Years Later, Alfie Williams turns Danny Boyle’s bloodiest zombie film into something achingly human.

Director Danny Boyle’s new zombie epic, 28 Years Later, is as gory and unrelenting as you’d hope. For almost two hours straight, it’s packed with neck-snapping kills, blood-slicked floors, and packs of the infected – zombies desperate to chow down on any survivor like a Big Mac. But the biggest shock isn’t the film’s brutality. It’s that, in a cast stacked with Hollywood royalty – Ralph Fiennes, Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson – it’s an unknown 14-year-old from Newcastle who ends up leading the entire one hour 55 minute runtime.

His name is Alfie Williams, a kid with a neat constellation of freckles that dance across his face. As Spike, a boy battling his way across the zombie-infested mainland in search of a doctor to save his dying mother Isla (played by Comer), he quietly out-acts people twice his age. Every flicker of emotion he maps across his face feels impossibly real – fear, anger, grief, determination – and, for the record, he’s never off-screen. It’s the sort of performance that changes the course of a young actor’s life, just like Danny’s first foray into the franchise, 28 Days Later, did for Cillian Murphy two decades ago.

Since the premiere a few weeks back, Alfie’s been learning to adjust to his new reality. “My friends keep sending me pictures of me on the side of buses on the poster, and to me that’s just so weird,” he laughs. “Like, one day I can tell my own kids, ‘Back in my day, I was on the side of buses.’”

Something tells us he’ll have plenty more stories to tell by then. He’s already filmed the sequel, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, teased in the final scenes by Spike’s uneasy alliance with a Saville-inspired zombie vigilante played by Jack O’Connell. A third instalment is already in the works.

“I can’t say much about The Bone Temple right now – as much as I’d love to tell you how excited I am about it,” he says. “But one thing I can say is that Spike can’t seem to catch a break…”

What makes Alfie’s performance so magnetic is the way he wears both Spike’s quiet resilience and stark fear at once, woven through every subtle flicker of his face. You see it in the moment his father takes him for his ‘first kill’ across the causeway to the mainland, only for it to end in a sweat-slick chase by an alpha zombie. You see it in his desperate drive to keep his mother alive. And you see it in the moments of realisation that he might not make it home, and that maybe he doesn’t want to.

Watching his own coming-of-age play out on screen has been just as emotional for Alfie’s dad, actor Alfie Dobson. “I first watched the finished film with my dad and my publicist at Sony headquarters in London. I remember him crying watching the film,” he says softly. “I think we all were.”

We’d be lying if we said we didn’t shed a tear or two ourselves. But once we’d pulled ourselves together, we sat down to get to know Alfie Williams a little bit better.

How did the road from Newcastle take you into acting?

Alfie Williams: Well, my dad is an actor and I wanted to be like him, so I joined his agency. Then I did a short film with Stephen Graham — it never actually got released, but he was so lovely and gave me his agent’s contact. They took me on, I did a couple of small parts, and then BAM! I got the part as Spike.

How did 28 Years Later first come into your life?

AW: I got the audition from my agent and then I sent a self-tape back to her. At that time I didn’t know it was for such a big project, then I got a call back and I found out it was for 28 Years Later –– a Danny Boyle film! That’s when I knew I had to get this part.

How did you prepare for your first audition as Spike?

AW: To prepare for my first audition as Spike, I just kind of used the synopsis that I’d been sent, which was that Spike (just named ‘young boy’ at the time) had never known life without the infected in it.

Who was the first person you told when you booked 28 Years Later, and what was their reaction?

AW: The first person I probably told was my best friend Abdul and he didn’t even believe me [laughs]. All jokes aside though, he was very happy for me.

Were you looking at anything specific to help build Spike? Was there something unexpected that ended up becoming central to who he is?

AW: Me and Danny created Spike together. Jodie, Aaron and I had two amazing weeks in a rehearsal space (with Danny also) where we came up with ideas about the characters and where they live and I would spend that time talking to Danny about who Spike is. He would guide me on who the character was and I would learn more about Spike while filming.

What’s scarier: zombies chasing you, or forgetting a line in front of Jodie Comer?

AW: Definitely forgetting a line in front of Jodie [laughs]! Not to brag or anything, but I never actually forgot a line in front of anyone. That’s because the day before a scene, when we’d get to the hotel, instead of relaxing and playing video games or watching a movie, I’d sit down and spend like two hours just rehearsing the same scene over and over, so I didn’t mess up in front of them.

 What was your favourite line to deliver?

AW: I didn’t actually say this line on set, it was in an ADR studio and the line was: ‘I’m gonna keep walking until I can’t see the sea’. I just think it’s a really meaningful sentence since Spike has spent his full life on an island in the sea and now he wants to just get as far away from there as possible.

Which cast member would survive amongst the infected the longest — and who would be bitten immediately?

AW: I think Jodie. She would survive quite a long time against the infected, but that’s because of that giant coat she wears in the film. She couldn’t be bitten easily [laughs]! I would be bitten first, but I would be a cool infected…imagine an Alfie Williams-infected just running through the streets going on all sorts of crazy adventures! Now that would be an awesome movie.

Have you received any surprising DMs since the premiere from other actors?

AW: I actually received a DM a couple days ago from the fantastic [Adolescence actor] Owen Cooper and we’ve been talking since then. We both agreed that we would love to work with each other someday.

Did you manage to steal anything from set as a souvenir?

AW: During the scene where Spike and Isla run into the Happy Eater diner, after we finished filming there were badges on the floor with the Happy Eater logo and I stole a couple of those. It’s one of my favourite scenes.  I also stole my jacket but I don’t talk about that much because I will get in trouble [laughs]…Don’t tell Danny!

If you could hang out with Spike in the real world for a day, where would you take him? What would you do?

AW: If I could hang out with Spike for one day, I’d show him so many memes and he’d have no idea what any of them meant. I’d also play him a lot of heavy music. I just feel like it would be like showing a Victorian child a mobile phone.

What artists are you listening to at the moment?

AW: My favourite band is Nirvana. They’re my favourite band ever – I’m a super fan. I’m a huge fan of Kurt Cobain’s early demos and home recordings too. Kurt Cobain is probably my biggest idol. The sad thing is, none of my friends know Nirvana, so I have nobody to talk to about how much I love them.

Who are your cinematic idols?

AW: My cinematic idols are Andrew Garfield, he’s amazing, J.K. Simmons is another fantastic actor I really admire. I absolutely loved him in Whiplash. I also really like Bryan Cranston because of how versatile he is as an actor. But I would really love to meet Karl Urban as I love his character in The Boys.

What would be your absolute dream role?

AW: One day, I would absolutely love to be in a Western. I just think it would be amazing. My favourite Western is Young Guns and I would love to play Billy the Kid if they ever made a remake of that film.  Someday I would also like to play Isaac Clarke in Dead Space if they ever decide to make a live-action version of the game. But I would have to wait a while, since the character is like 40 years old!

Words – Ella Bardsley

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