The actor, who plays a David Koresh-inspired villain, also reveals the signature scene he pitched to Marvel and reflects on hashing out the scripts with Isaac during jogging sessions. Ethan Hawke and Oscar Isaac‘s collaboration on Marvel Studios’ latest Disney+ series, Moon Knight, began as a “meet-cute” of sorts at a Brooklyn coffee shop. The two acclaimed actors live only a few blocks from each other, and as soon as they first encountered each other at their neighborhood establishment, they quickly shared their mutual admiration.
Isaac, who was already developing Moon Knight at the time, wasted no time and pitched Hawke on playing the series’ antagonist, which he immediately accepted. That role would later become the enigmatic cult leader, Arthur Harrow.
When they eventually started shooting together in mid-2021, Hawke and Isaac bonded over the fact that they were filmmaker Paul Schrader’s two most recent leading men in First Reformed (2017) and The Card Counter (2021), respectively. They also discovered that they both love to sort out their work while running.
“We both realized that we like to run. So it was a great way to talk and get to know each other and make small talk about the show and work out problems with our scripts,” Hawke tells The Hollywood Reporter. “That’ll probably be what I remember most about our summer. Just battling out the scripts as we ran around Budapest.”
Hawke, who has admittedly been critical of superhero films in the past, gained a whole new perspective on the genre when Marvel Studios welcomed his creativity with open arms. The opening scene of Moon Knight best exemplifies the creative freedom he was granted as Hawke pitched the idea of his character lining the insoles of his shoes with crushed glass, all while listening to Bob Dylan’s “Every Grain of Sand.” (The scene is reminiscent of how Billy Bob Thornton reputedly created his limp in Sling Blade, but Hawke believes the idea came to him from reading the works of Flannery O’Connor.)
“[Marvel Studios has] tremendous faith and belief in the actor’s ability to contribute. That opening scene is a great example of [Marvel] using your creativity to help get you to invest in the show and to come up with original ideas,” Hawke shares. “So I was really impressed by that. At one point when Oscar and I were rehearsing, I said to him, ‘You realize that they’re being so kind? They believe in us so much that if this doesn’t work, it’s our fault.
We can’t blame anybody.’ But that’s really empowering as a performer. Yes, you have to work in their kitchen, but they’re going to let you work.”
Oscar Isaac, Ethan Hawke, and May Calamawy star in the new Marvel Studios series on Disney Plus, Three months and some change after the release of Spider-Man: No Way Home, the latest entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe arrives next week. The promotional cycle for the Moon Knight series on Disney+ is in full swing, and a handful of new videos tease what’s in store for a previously unseen side of the MCU.
First up, a featurette introduces the show’s main characters. Moon Knight (Oscar Isaac, Dune) is described as “the fists of vengeance,” and he’s seen deploying his signature crescent dart weapons. Also known as Marc Spector, he’s a highly skilled mercenary with dissociative identity disorder who shares a body with the bumbling museum gift shop employee Steven Grant.
May Calamawy (Ramy) says Layla El-Faouly is “a force of strength”–who seemingly knows how to throw a punch herself. She’s noted as being “a friend from the past,” though she also acknowledges the Steven Grant alter ego.
“You don’t want to come face to face with his unworldly power,” warns Ethan Hawke (Boyhood) of Arthur Harrow, a “follower of Amunet” who wields a magical staff. Being the disciple of another Egyptian deity is presumably what will bring him into conflict with Moon Knight, who is inspired to fight crime by the god Khonshu.
The trio also reunites out of costume in the Marvel Studios waiting room, a WiFi-free place for actors to go so they don’t spoil anything. Isaac delivers a heavily bleeped list of plot points and finds a pamphlet titled “Things That Are OK To Share About Moon Knight,” which is, of course, completely blank.
Moon Knight Star Reacts to Mark Ruffalo
Moon Knight is set to take center stage as the next MCU project on Disney+. As a result, the upcoming Marvel series has been bombarded by rumors in the past weeks, one of them being a potential Avenger sighting in the form of Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk. The Green Goliath’s rumored inclusion has made headlines ever since a photo of Ruffalo and Oscar Isaac in Budapest made rounds on social media during the show’s production.
Ruffalo previously addressed the aforementioned photo, saying that he has “learned the hard way” when it comes to spoiling things. However, this didn’t stop Marvel fans from speculating about his role in the series, as a recent rumor indicated that the Hulk would appear in the series.
Isaac added more fuel to the rumors by pointing out that his Moon Knight would get along really well with Ruffalo’s Hulk, admitting that he “could see it happen.”
Now, another Moon Knight star has addressed the Avengers-centric rumor:
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