Oscar Isaac describes the “mental torment” of deciding whether to do Moon Knight
Isaac describes doing a Marvel Cinematic Universe project as one of the biggest risks of his career
Aux News Oscar Isaac
If there’s one big risk to take in the entertainment industry, it’s taking a role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, that famously rag-tag studio supported by noted Hollywood underdog, Disney. During The Hollywood Reporter’s Drama Actor Emmy Roundtable, Oscar Isaac reflected on the major leap for his career that was Moon Knight.
“Moon Knight felt that way. Like, ‘Man, I’m going to go down hard with this thing,’” he said. “Just the level of embarrassment that it would be, once you throw on a cape, you know what I mean? And you’re out in front of it. It’s like, ‘Holy shit, I’m really doing this thing.’”
Isaac knows what he’s talking about, coming from one of the least-well regarded X-Men movies of all time. And in fairness, playing dual roles on the show was definitely a swing, given the hokey British accent and general zaniness of the lesser-known comic book character.
So committing to the superhero franchise was no easy decision for the multi-franchise veteran. “[It] was so much about, like, ‘Is this the stupidest thing? Is this a smart thing?’ It was such mental torment just to make the decision.”
Would that all our most difficult decisions come with a Disney check at the end of the day… Samuel L. Jackson (who also very much knows what he’s talking about re: the MCU) pointed out that the big tentpole flicks allow actors to pursue more meaningful artistic endeavors, but Isaac insisted that Moon Knight checked all the boxes.
“The trick with this one was, like, ‘Can I do both?’” he said. “Can you smuggle in the thing that matters to me, the reason why I like doing it, so every morning when that alarm goes off, I could be excited to get to work and not just be like, ‘I’ve got to get through this to get that check or whatever.’ And it seemed like this was an opportunity, maybe because of the TV landscape, where there seems to be a lot more risk-taking, to do this bizarre thing that happened to be in the case of a superhero genre film.”
Perhaps we have reached the point where the MCU is such a monolith that it might contain both blockbusters and small, character-focused art pieces under its own umbrella. Whether the latter category includes Moon Knight, a series that prominently featured giant, CGI Egyptian animal gods, remains up for debate.
43 Comments
“Doing the big, flashy, franchise thing may not be the best choice” seems an odd sentiment coming from someone who starred in three Star Wars movies.
I think it was more about it not being an established character/franchise in the genre, not the genre itself. I don’t think there is much exposure risk being in a Star Wars movie (unless you’re female, apparently.)
Jake Lloyd might argue that one.
touche
Isn’t it a open secret that Oscar Isaac was pretty done with the Star Wars movies by the end and regretted signing up to do them. I get real Harrison Ford vibes from him.
Near the start of episode 9 I kept expecting him to break character and walk off set he seemed so “done with this shit”
I feel like that’s the attitude of most people who starred in Star Wars movies.
Shit, don’t let him near a plane.
I can imagine, after they did his character so dirty in the last two movies.
well considering the star wars movies he starred in i think his hesitance to do more is understandable.
Maybe you’re not familiar with the reception of those movies?
Considering how both his Star Wars and X-men appearances ended up, the hesitation may have been informed by experience.
It definitely was. He hasn’t exactly been “vocal” about his dissatisfaction with SW (being a good soldier and all), but it’s been extremely easy to read between the lines.
I still remember how JJ Abrams originally meant his character to be a glorified cameo who died not halfway into the first movie, and maybe that was what he thought he was signing up for.
Actually, he was the one that asked Abrams to let him survive, since he’d recently played quite a few characters that died.To be fair, I can’t imagine he could’ve anticipated quite the level of vitriol that was going to explode around the franchise in the next few years, and by the time RoS released it was pretty clear all the primary actors were totally done with this shit.
…and there it is, plain and simple.
The British people I know tell me his accent was actually pretty good.
Since he was playing someone who wasn’t actually British but actually wasn’t, it still could work by having him being someone drawing on his subconscious memories of what he thinks British people sound like as opposed to what they’re actually like (and hence explain any imperfections if there are any), couldn’t it?
His character’s literally basing it off some pulp fictional character he watched as a kid. We see the show during the start of one of the later episodes.
The accent itself, from a technical perspective, was quite good. It just sounded wrong, especially when he was using slang.
As a Brit, personally the only moment that made me double take was his one use of “bruv” but to be fair I don’t hang out in the circles of people who do use that word.The rest of it was pretty spot on I felt.
As a yank that’s watched a couple British of shows and movies, your people seem to use bruv quite a bit. Although I’ve never heard it in the wild in my work travels to the UK.
Oh it’s definitely a thing, I just meant it sounded odd when he said it, might be delivery, might be just me not being used to hearing it as I don’t have any friends who use it.
The greatest ever real-world use of “Bruv” is still the bystander at a terrorist incident in a Tube station (video embedded in the article): https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/dec/13/you-aint-no-muslim-bruv-man-leytonstone-denounces-extremism
The only people I’ve heard shitting on that accent are Americans on Film Twitter and the AV Club comments looking for things to shit on in a Marvel thing. The British people I know thought it was solid, and one who didn’t know him as an actor thought he was a British actor.
they’re being sarcastic. Isaac’s accent was awful, like Dick Van Dykes “mockney” accent in Mary Poppins, BUT Isaac’s commitment really sold it and made it enjoyable. i’m english.
have they announced anything more for the character yet? doesn’t look like he even has anything in production right now. feels like he needed to do it because…he’s not doing anything else. i like him a lot, but hopefully he does something interesting soon. aside from the card counter (which was good) his pre and post star wars career look very different.
“feels like he needed to do it because…he’s not doing anything else.”
Is that how you think people choose their roles? Do you think there was no other option for him if he didn’t do Moon Knight?
He was in Dune just a few months before this came out, which was probably the biggest release of the pandemic era. I agree that Star Wars probably didn’t help his career, but he seems like a pretty bankable star, and he does a mix of blockbusters like Star Wars as well as more serious movies.
He did Scenes from a Marriage.
He has four projects in post or pre-production right now, as of IMDB. I’d say he’s doing just fine.
Can you not with the ‘hokey British accent’ bullshit? Many actual British people have said that his accent was pretty good for a specific type of Londoner. I loved his performance.
This is the guy who did X-Men Apocalypse and the Sequel Trilogy, right?
Isaac pulled out all the stops as Moon Knight. I just wish he did it in a better written show. It tried to jump straight into deconstruction without giving audiences enough context first.https://mattthecatania.wordpress.com/2022/05/04/moon-knight-is-disney-going-through-a-phase/
Aabsolutely loved Moon Knight, for me one of the best Marvel series they have done, firstly, didnt take itself too seriously, but not the ridiculousness of Thor, loved his british accent and the whole persona of Steven with a V. Truly think Oscar Issac is a grossly under rated actor, he definitely deserves better and bigger roles. One thing I took from this round table was a lot of older established actors are happy to keep doing what they do but OI seems a lot happier to push himself and accept new challenges and open to new ways and ideas. Hoping there is a series 2 and Oscar Isaac and the tremendous Ethan Hawke are the leads.
They struck gold when it was about British Oscar Isaac finding out he had a murderous alter ego. But then for whatever reason they were like “enough of that. Mediocre mythology time.”
This just reinforces my belief that everyone ought to do a thankless office job for a coupla years.
“Can you smuggle in the thing that matters to me?”
Raisins? Sausage? What is it you need smuggled?
It makes it sound like he was working with a bunch of jaded hacks, so he had to sneak in any artistic expression without them noticing.It doesn’t say much of his colleagues. They can’t be too happy about that quote.
I don’t think that was his intention here. It probably has less to do with his colleagues and more to do with the powers-that-be, dictating what he and his colleagues could even do with the character, themes, and narrative. By the way things played out, he seemed to find an okay middle ground, and that’s only possible because everyone was relatively on the same page – occasional janky writing and CG aside.
I was having a good day until I ready he was in mental torment trying to decide which movie to star in . Now I am devastated and hope he finds peace even before myself. He so deserves it.
Gosh, that must’ve been hard for him.Oh well, time to go to the Coinstar so I can buy dinner.
I don’t blame him. Making a deal with The Mouse is a stressful decision.