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The Walking Dead Adds Tony Nominee Lauren Ridloff to Season 9 Cast

The Children of a Lesser God star will be playing the show's first deaf character

liam-mathews
Liam Mathews

The Walking Dead will be heading to a quiet place in Season 9.

Entertainment Weeklyreports that the AMC zombie drama has cast Tony nominee Lauren Ridloff for a multi-episode arc.

Ridloff will play Connie, "a seasoned survivor deft at using her senses to read people, situations, and trouble. Her character is deaf and uses American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate." Fans of the comics may be familiar with the name, as there is already a character from the comics named Connie. She is a member of a new group of survivors who comes to live at Alexandria, though that Connie is not deaf. But that could be a detail added just for the show. In the comics, the group arrives after a time jump, and Season 9 is confirmed to contain a time jump.

Ridloff, who is deaf, earned a Tony nomination this year for her performance in the Broadway play Children of a Lesser God. The Walking Dead will be her first major television role. She will not be the only Tony nominee among the cast; Danai Gurira was nominated in 2016 for writing the play Eclipse.

The Walking Dead Season 9 premieres in October on AMC.