Character sheet for the film The Two Popes.
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Pope Benedict XVI
Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger / Pope Benedict XVI
Played By: Anthony Hopkins
The embattled leader of the Catholic Church, whose conservative ideology (and introverted personality) is at odds with calls for change within the Church.
- Born in the Wrong Century: For all his scholarship, Pope Benedict is completely out of touch with the basics of popular culture like the music of The Beatles and ABBA.
- Deadpan Snarker: He's pretty good at them.Bergoglio: Life - the life He gave us - is all change. You are the successor of San Pietro. San Pietro was married!Benedict: Oh, thank you for letting me know. I had no idea.
- Defrosting Ice King: Because of their personality and ideological differences, the pope is initially cool to Bergoglio - even snubbing him before a luncheon. But, several long conversations later, Benedict eventually warms up enough to watch the World Cup with Pope Francis as friends.
- Hidden Depths: The pope is an aloof scholar who enjoys theology, literature, classical music...and a series about a police dog.
- Hiding Behind the Language Barrier: Whenever he needs to make an announcement to an assembly of cardinals that might be politically problematic (e.g. that he's renouncing the papacy), Benedict does so in Latin. According to him, only 20% of them immediately understand, and therefore a maximum of only 20% of them can be mad about what he's said.
- Loner-Turned-Friend: The pope is self-admittedly "always alone", but by the end gains a friend in Pope Francis.
- Verbal Tic: Frequently responds with: "Yeah." to statements made by others.
- What's Up, King Dude?: Decides to leave the Room of Tears while the Sistine Chapel is open to tourists. Opting to not have Bergoglio ask his team of bodyguards to clear the Chapel, Benedict simply walks among them to the exit, to their (and his) delight. Many blurry pictures of him are taken.
Pope Francis
Jorge Mario Bergoglio / Pope Francis
Played By: Jonathan Pryce, Juan Minujín (young)
A Jesuit cardinal from Argentina. He is seen as a reformer by his supporters, and gets elevated to the papacy after Pope Benedict XVI abdicates.
- Celibate Hero: Bergoglio gives up his fiancée to join the priesthood. When asked if he knows what he's giving up to enter seminary, he says yes: "She even has a name."
- Internal Reformist: Bergoglio is a Type 1. Other cardinals peg him as a reformer, and he plans to use his authority to bring about slow, lawful change.
- My Greatest Failure: During his youth, Bergoglio suspended two political dissident priests and thus allowed the Argentinian Junta to imprison and torture them. That deed hangs on him heavily and he reminds Pope Benedict that he cannot be the next Pope with that kind of misdeed in his past. Benedict disagrees.
- Reassigned to Antarctica: After failing to protect two priests during Argentina's Dirty War, Bergoglio is estranged from his fellow Jesuits, demoted from his role as provincial superior, and reassigned to be a regular priest and confessor in Córdoba.
- What's Up, King Dude?: From his time as a Jesuit priest all the way to the papacy, Bergoglio never does away with his practice of meeting and engaging with the common people, especially the impoverished or disadvantaged.
