"Let's play."
The final quote of Netflix's The Queen's Gambit has sat with us long after we've digested the cast's tour de force performances. As E! readers surely know, The Queen's Gambit follows Beth Harmon (played by Anya Taylor-Joy) as she transforms from stoic orphan to cutthroat chess player.
On learning chess for the role, Anya told Seth Meyers, "I had to learn, like, understand chess for myself because I felt that people care about it so much that I couldn't just show up and not understand the theory of it. But the theory and then applying that theory are two very different things."
The drama series is based off Walter Tevis' 1983 novel of the same name, and is a hit among critics.
Anya won the Best Actress in a Limited Series or TV Movie award at the 2021 Golden Globes and the Outstanding Actress in a Miniseries or Television Movie prize at the 2021 Screen Actors Guild Awards. Next up? Anya is nominated in the Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Or Anthology Series or Movie category for the 2021 Emmys.
And this critical acclaim is well deserved, as her performance had us itching to learn chess. Still, the entire cast—which includes Bill Camp, Marielle Heller, Harry Melling, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Moses Ingram and more—pulled out stellar performances.
Case in point: Not only is The Queen's Gambit up for Outstanding Limited Or Anthology Series at the Emmys, but Moses and Thomas are both nominated in supporting categories.
Back when we consumed the Netflix mini-series, we found ourselves laughing, crying and Googling where we've seen these performers before. And, following our Internet search, we discovered interesting tidbits about the cast of The Queen's Gambit.
We're talking a Harry Potter alum, a Tony-nominated actor, a Yale School of Drama Graduate and the little boy from Love Actually. Furthermore, co-creator Scott Frank had several actors from his hit Western mini-series Godless appear in The Queen's Gambit.
So, if you're like us and curious about where you've seen The Queen's Gambit cast before, scroll through the images below.
The Queen's Gambit is streaming on Netflix now.