Apple TV's Cape Fear has three episodes in and has already delivered one of the most surprising casting reveals of the summer. In Episode 3, the identity of a mysterious masked woman who has been stalking main antagonist Max Cady is finally revealed: she is played by Juliette Lewis, who appeared in Martin Scorsese's 1991 film version of Cape Fear.
According to Collider, Lewis's casting is a direct callback to the original movie. In that adaptation, she played Danielle Bowden, the daughter of the family terrorized by Max Cady, then played by Robert De Niro. Her performance earned her an Academy Award nomination at just 18 years old.
In the new Apple TV series, Max Cady is played by Javier Bardem. The show follows his release from prison after being exonerated. Through the first two episodes, viewers learn fragments of his past, including a childhood marked by abandonment and trauma, and scenes in which he was forced into a cage by his father. A hooded woman wearing large sunglasses and a medical mask keeps appearing near him, and the mystery of who she is drives a significant portion of the tension in the early episodes.
In Episode 3, the woman knocks on a motel room door belonging to Anna Bowden, played by Amy Adams. She calls out to Max, jingles a dog collar, and tells him she has a present for him. Before Anna can get a look at her, the woman disappears.
Later, Max returns to his new home to find she has broken in and left behind a small television and a VHS tape, along with an envelope. The grainy video shows the woman removing her mask for the first time as she sings an eerie version of the Butthole Surfers' song "Jingle of a Dog's Collar." Inside the envelope is the same dog collar she had tried to give him at the motel.
Max's reaction is extreme. He begins hyperventilating and crying before picking up the entire television set and slamming it to the ground. He then strikes it repeatedly with a fire poker until it is completely destroyed.
The scene sets up questions the series has yet to answer about the connection between the mysterious woman and Max's past. With six episodes remaining in the ten-part miniseries, Lewis's role and what her character wants from Max appear to be central to where the story is heading.
