Harlan Coben shares what changed his mind about Fool Me Once's Michelle Keegan

Watch Harlan Coben share what changed his mind about Fool Me Once's Michelle Keegan

What did you miss?

Harlan Coben admitted he didn't first picture Michelle Keegan as his lead in Fool Me Once, however that all changed when he met her.

The gripping thriller writer, who has had many successes with Netflix, appeared on Lorraine with stand-in host Christine Lampard to discuss his upcoming series Missing You. Of course, talk turned to the casting of his characters - the morning after Coben said he doesn't want George Clooney to play his beloved character Myron Bolitar who he has been writing for 30 years.

Fool Me Once stars former Coronation Street actor Keegan as the leading lady Maya Stern, who is mourning for her husband when she mysteriously sees him on their nanny camera after attending his funeral. Admittedly on Friday morning, the bestselling author said he "didn't see" Keegan in his mind as his female lead when he had written the book.

What, how and why?

"The casting of the actor would be," Christine Lampard said. At this point, the author interjected to finish her sentence with the simple word: "Hard." Lampard agreed saying: "It's always difficult."

Coben elaborated: "It's always interesting. You know, I wrote the character for, when I started Fool Me Once I didn't see Michelle Keegan."

Meeting with Keegan changed things because he was so onboard with her passion for the character when they talked about the story. Coben lifted the lid on that extraordinary moment that changed his mind. He said: "But once I met with Michelle, once we talked about it, once I saw her passion - all of a sudden in my mind, the character is Michelle Keegan. That's part of the fun of it."

Read more: What we know about Netflix’s new Harlan Coben show Missing You

Harlan Coben and Richard Armitage

Keegan starred alongside Joanna Lumley, Richard Armitage and Adeel Akhtar in Fool Me Once. Armitage is one actor who is always on Coben's mind.

The actor is returning to the screen in the latest adaptation of Coben's Missing You. Sweetly the author called him his "good luck charm" when it comes to the TV series and he explained they have "fun" together.

"The next one is called Missing You," he said. "Richard has just been a good luck charm at this stage in the game, I'm afraid. We have a lot of fun doing these things. He's a wonderful actor too. It's interesting to try and make you not see the character he was before."

Armitage has had starring roles in Netflix adaptations of Coben's books: The Stranger, Stay Close, and Fool Me Once.

Recently Armitage took on the lead role in spy-drama Red Eye which was on ITV. The actor said his latest project Red Eye had parallels with Coben's work. He told The Radio Times: "I do actually [see parallels], and mainly because it's the kind of show that I enjoy watching as well as participating in.

"Harlan works very much on that kind of page-turner, end of episode hook. He uses technology a lot to sort of unravel characters. And I think Peter [A Dowling, director] has done a similar thing with this."