Copley plays the administrator in District 9, a performance largely improvised, delivered in a register of nervous officialdom that makes the character's later transformation genuinely distressing. The film depends on him being unremarkable at the start, and the improvisation is why he is.
He is South African and came from producing and directing rather than performing, and he was cast by a longstanding collaborator. His approach remains improvisational, and he frequently develops accents and vocal tics that become the spine of a characterisation, sometimes to the point of being unrecognisable between roles. Directors cast him for exactly that unpredictability.
Recurring subjects: complicity, ordinary men who enforce a system until it turns on them, and comedy used immediately before horror. He plays panic convincingly, and his willingness to be pathetic on screen is unusual for an actor in genre leads, which is what makes the character's decline so hard to watch.
His debut performance is a common example of improvisational casting producing something no conventional approach would have found, and the film's success established him internationally. He has worked repeatedly with the same director since, and his subsequent roles have leaned toward antagonists and eccentrics.
For viewers who want science fiction with documentary texture and a genuinely uncomfortable lead. Suited to anyone interested in improvisation on screen, and to those approaching South African genre cinema.
