Milo Callaghan on Stepping Into the Spotlight with The Rainmaker

Landing your first lead role in a TV series is no small feat, especially when it’s a John Grisham adaptation in the U.S. market, sharing scenes with heavy-hitters like Lana Parrilla and John Slattery. 

For Milo Callaghan, who stars as Rudy Baylor in USA’s The Rainmaker, it’s been a career milestone that comes with both excitement and responsibility.

We had the opportunity to talk with him about his starring role in the new show, and he is an absolute delight. If he pulls some of himself into Rudy Baylor, Rudy will be irresistible.

Stepping into a role that a successful actor like Matt Damon has already played might seem daunting, but not to Callahan.

“I was aware and really wanted to honor the people whose shoulders I was standing on,” Callaghan says. “Your Matt Damons, your Coppolas, John Grisham’s source material. But beyond that, it started with the scripts. They were tight and full of information, so I just got to work.”

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That meant letting go of constant comparisons and focusing on the relationships he was building with his castmates.

“If your energy is going inwards, you’re going to be hypercritical and miss the joy of exploring the moment,” he explains. “We had an amazing cast, an amazing crew, and my job was to serve the material and the people I was working with.”

Building a New Rudy Baylor

Unlike the novel or the movie, the series gives Callaghan much more room to explore Rudy over time. 

Showrunner Michael Seitzman’s scripts offer “new ground to explore” — including relationships and situations that didn’t exist in the original works.

“It’s a privilege and a joy,” he says. 

“There’s a bit of originality in there, but also things Grisham wrote that couldn’t be explored in the film. Bringing something fresh that people haven’t seen or read in relation to The Rainmaker before has been a pleasure.”

From Idealist to Realist

Rudy begins the season with all the passion and moral conviction of a fresh law school grad, but that idealism is tested almost immediately. 

“Michael used to say we were creating the coming-of-age story of Rudy Baylor,” Callaghan says. “To come of age, you have to explore the dark side of failure. Only through the will and potential of failure can you experience real success.”

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That journey is shaped by the two opposing forces in Rudy’s life — Bruiser, his pragmatic new boss who plays to win, and Sarah, whose betrayal cuts deep.

“Sarah’s betrayal hits at his biggest insecurity — the loss of his brother,” Callaghan says. “That grief probably drove his decision to pursue Tinley Britt in the first place, and it drives his tenacity after he’s fired.” 

Bruiser, meanwhile, represents the weight of experience. “She and Leo Drummond have overcome obstacles and made morally dubious choices along the way. 

“Rudy is completely lost when he’s thrust into that environment. Everything he thought he knew about the world is shattered, and that makes for interesting growth and drama.”

A Backstory That Shapes Everything

Though Rudy’s history with his brother unfolds slowly over the season, Callaghan says it was central to his approach from the start.

“It’s not easy, but the payoff is that as people stick with the show, more of that unfolds,” he says.

 “You begin to understand decisions that seemed rash early on. There’s a moral base and structure that underlies everything Rudy does, and that’s deeply rooted in his past. As the layers peel back, you see why he fights the way he does — and why he can’t walk away.”

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For Callaghan, that gradual reveal is part of what makes Rudy worth following. “He’s learning who he is, just as the audience is learning it. And that’s the heart of his development.”

Be sure to check out our take on this new USA Network series and tune in on August 15 at 10/9c on USA Network to catch Callahan as Rudy Baylor.

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