Throughout his career, Oscar Isaac has ventured into one massive franchise after the next, appearing in the likes of X-Men: Apocalypse, an entire Star Wars trilogy, Dune, and later this year, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse - Part One. Now, he's on the cusp of making his entrance into the most successful cinematic universe of them all, the MCU.
Having already dipped his toes into Marvel storytelling with X-Men: Apocalyse in 2016 - an experience that presumably didn't turn out as creatively fulfilling as he likely hoped - it wouldn't necessarily have been a shock if he wasn't in any rush to sign on for another superhero movie. However, as fate would have it, Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios came calling in late 2020 and he soon found himself cast as the fan-favorite Moon Knight.
During our interview with acclaimed director Mohamed Diab, who helmed the series premiere as well as episodes three, five, and six; he revealed his initial pitch to Isaac and how the intimacy of Moon Knight helped convince him to come on-board to topline one of Marvel's wildest projects yet.
"Oscar was exhausted from big movies, he just came from Star Wars, X Men, Dune, and he wanted to do something small. So, to convince him - or something intimate, not small, something intimate - and to convince him that we can do that on a bigger scale wasn't an easy job at the beginning.
Oscar saw my films, and he told me, “Mohamed, what the hell are you doing here?,” because this is exactly what he wanted to do, one of my intimate films, and I told him, it's not exclusive to small films, we can do that on a bigger film.
I think he was my biggest ally through the project, to make this into a character study, to make this into something different and I'm so proud of the result that we have at the end because if you've got all the action, if you've got all the big things, there is still a story. There's a story about someone who's struggling to learn how to live with himself and ironically, I actually feel if you saw my films one day, this feels like an extension of my films. Everyone who knows my films will see episode one, for example, in the premiere, they felt okay, this makes sense. Now, I understand, there is a bridge between this and that.
So, I was lucky to have Oscar with this mindset, because he wasn't a guy who wanted to be with Marvel and just say, “Okay, I get it. I made it. Let's get paid. Let's put on the cape. Let's get the figurine.” No, no, he wanted to do something special and I would say the same thing about me and Ethan, who is a legend in independent cinema and in the independent world and all of a sudden, making the choice to join something like this. So, he needed for himself to have something special. So, the two of them and May, presenting and representing an Arab character, they always brought it on. I always had to be ready and had to always be questioning everything and that made us all work to make the story deeper and better."
Moon Knight starts streaming March 30!
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