How ‘Billy the Kid’ star Tom Blyth played a ‘charismatic killer’

nypost.com:

seen his picture. I knew him as an iconic name. But I hadn’t done deep reading,” said Blyth, 27, who’s based in Brooklyn.“Billy the Kid,” premiering Sunday (April 24) on Epix, was created by Michael Hirst (“Vikings“).

It’s an adventure series set mostly in the 1870s and depicts a dramatized version of Billy’s life, starting from his humble roots as the son of Irish immigrants living in New York who decide to search for more opportunities out West. “When you get told you’re playing this historic character, you kind of feel a responsibility to do right by them and tell their whole truth,” said Blyth, who’s also known for HBO’s “The Gilded Age.”“But for someone like Billy, there’s no video footage of him, no recordings, I can’t go and learn his voice.

But what I can do is read as much about him as I can, and then interpret and build something from the ground up as he speaks to me from beyond the grave, so to speak.”  In the series, Billy’s family finds that life out West isn’t the land of opportunity as it was advertised to them in New York.

Billy endures years of hardships, including losing his family to consumption after grueling work for low pay and harsh living conditions. “So much of who we think he is is based on him being an outlaw and a killer,” said Blyth. “But in the script, he’s a fully-formed human being who plays music and is a flirt and a charismatic person.