Walton Goggins on Playing The Ghoul and Cooper Howard: Finding Humanity in 'Fallout's' Dual Roles

Walton Goggins brings profound depth to his dual roles in Prime Video's 'Fallout,' portraying both The Ghoul, a ravaged survivor haunted by loss, and Cooper Howard, a pre-war propaganda icon representing the American Dream. The characters are two versions of the same man across different timelines, united by emotional devastation and existential searching. The Ghoul lost his wife and daughter during the nuclear apocalypse and has spent two centuries searching for their fate, while Cooper Howard was exploited as a cowboy propaganda tool by the very faction responsible for near-global extinction. Both characters converge at a painful crossroads of existence.

Goggins approaches his work with meticulous attention to the humanity beneath the surface, regardless of external transformations. For The Ghoul, the actor works beneath layers of prosthetics, yet relies on his eyes and emotional core to convey the character's soul. He explained his method: "I don't think about my eyes. I don't think about my body… I just really imagine life as this person." One particularly moving moment for Goggins involved a scene where The Ghoul, clinging to a pole, strips away all ornamentation to his essential identity: "I'm a human. You know, I'm a man. I have a family and I have a daughter."

Reflecting on his acting journey, Goggins traced his career from 1987 through decades of patient groundwork before his breakthrough came in the early 2000s with his role as Detective Shane Vendrell on 'The Shield.' That pivotal performance opened doors to acclaimed work across numerous series including 'Justified,' 'The Righteous Gemstones,' 'The White Lotus,' and now 'Fallout.' Goggins expressed genuine gratitude for his humble beginnings, noting that he was "afforded the opportunity to fail, you know, over and over again, without being in a spotlight." This extended apprenticeship mirrors the journeys of many of his acting peers, including Shea Wigham, Carrie Preston, and Justin Theroux, creating lifelong friendships forged across decades of storytelling and mutual respect.

Goggins views his dual performances as an exploration of universal suffering and resilience. Whether hidden beneath prosthetics or embodying a clean-cut propaganda figure, the work always circles back to the persistence of humanity, no matter how much the world has tried to strip it away. His approach reveals that even after centuries of trauma and loss, or after being weaponized by historical forces, the core of human identity—family, love, and basic dignity—endures as the character's anchor.