Florence Pugh Transforms Into Pure Evil In Netflix's East Of Eden Trailer

Published Sep 2, 2026, 8:30 AM EDT Matthew Rudoy is one of ScreenRant's Movie & TV News Editors. He covers the latest in movie & TV news, with a focus on major franchises like Star Wars, The Boys, and Game of Thrones, and also writes some features and reviews. He wrote lists for ScreenRant from 2017-2022, became a news writer in 2023, a senior staff writer in 2024, and an editor in 2025. Florence Pugh brings an all-time evil character to life in Netflix's East of Eden trailer. The 74-year-old novel by John Steinbeck is being adapted into a seven-episode limited series, with Pugh playing Cathy Ames, who is widely regarded as one of literature's most evil characters. In the 1955 film, Jo Van Fleet played Cathy, and won the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. However, this was solely an older version of the character, as the movie does not adapt the first half of the source material when she is a younger woman. Netflix has now released a new trailer for its East of Eden miniseries, which opens with Cathy talking about how there are monsters born to human parents. She describes monsters as "a variation from the accepted normal" alongside footage of her bloodied character crawling through the grass, until she is discovered by the Trask family. Adam Trask (Christopher Abbott) tells Cathy that she warms the entire house even without leaving her room, while his brother, Charles Trask (Mike Faist), warns that "a girl like that doesn't just fall out of the sky." Check out the trailer below: The footage goes on to show Cathy and Adam falling in love and getting married, but her narration about the subtleties of evil makes it clear that something sinister is afoot. After Cathy abandons her children, Samuel Hamilton (Ciarán Hinds) cautions Adam to not also leave them without a father. Lee (Hoon Lee) warns what will happen when the truth is discovered, and there is a fast-cutting montage that features a house on fire. While the trailer features plenty of narration about what it means to be evil, it only hints at what this means for Cathy, and why it is so heavily intertwined with her character's legacy. Unlike the 1955 movie, the seven-episode series will cover far more of her life, providing a deeper understanding of her true nature and the consequential decisions that she makes. Caleb "Cal" Trask (James Dean) is positioned as the main character of the film, but the trailer emphasizes that Cathy will be at the forefront in this adaptation. This is partly because the story starts when Cathy and Adam are young and before Cal and Aron Trask are even born. Featuring Samuel Hamilton and Lee is also a major change from the movie, as both characters were cut entirely from that version of the story. Netflix's East of Eden was created by Zoe Kazan, whose grandfather, Elia Kazan, directed the movie from 1955. She serves as the co-showrunner and executive producer alongside Jeb Stuart. In addition to Cathy, Adam, Charles, Samuel Hamilton, and Lee, the cast includes Joseph Zada as Cal, Joe Anders as Aron, Tracy Letts as Cyrus Trask, and Martha Plimpton as Faye. For several of the stars, East of Eden comes before they appear in major theatrical releases. Zada is playing Haymitch Abernathy in The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, Pugh plays the respective roles of Princess Irulan and Yelena Belova in Dune: Part Three and Avengers: Doomsday, and it was recently announced that Abbott has been cast as Professor X/Charles Xavier in the Marvel Cinematic Universe's upcoming X-Men movie. All episodes of East of Eden come to Netflix on October 1. Network Netflix Directors Garth Davis Cast Christopher Abbott Adam Trask