Jonathan Majors Walked Out Of First Marvel Meeting
Jonathan Majors was left waiting for so long before his first meeting with Marvel that he decided to walk out.
Jonathan Majors is a rising star today poised to have a breakout year thanks to playing the villain in the films Creed 3 and Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania. While the Lovecraft Country star has been receiving rave reviews already for his portrayal of Kang the Conqueror, the new Thanos-level threat in the MCU, he almost didn’t get the part. Variety reports that Majors was annoyed at waiting to meet with Marvel’s casting director, and not wanting to be a burden at the busy studio, got up to leave.
That’s right, Jonathan Majors, the man that will be carrying the next two years of Marvel films, got up and left before his first Marvel meeting had even started. Fresh out of Yale’s drama school at the time, Majors’ career could have turned out significantly different had he managed to get off of the property before being stopped. Fortunately for everyone that enjoyed his portrayal in the season 1 finale of Loki, someone stopped him from going out the door and the result was the first of many productive chats.
As he explained in an interview, “I think it was three years later that we had the Kang chat. And there’s no trepidation now, especially because of who Kang is. When I said yes, we got the whole picture, and what is being laid out is cohesive.”
Early reviews for Ant-Man 3 have the film as one of the worst in the MCU, but that’s before the general public gets to see it and usually Marvel movies rebound once fans get to weigh in. What has been consistent, even across the negative reviews, is that Jonathan Majors as Kang is the best part of the film. Considering he’ll be featured in many more movies moving forward that is only good news for the future of the MCU.
According to Kevin Feige “He’s the highest-testing villain we’ve ever had in any of our friends and families [screenings]. That’s really saying something with a movie like this.” The head architect for the MCU admits that he was interested in casting Jonathan Majors after seeing The Last Black Man In San Francisco, one of 2019’s best independent films.
Despite being personally sought after by arguably the most powerful man in Hollywood, Jonathan Majors nearly walked away from the biggest opportunity in his life. After going through a rough childhood, Majors was actually inspired to become an actor by the greatest performance in a superhero film: Heath Ledger’s Joker from The Dark Knight. If the next big MCU villain channels even just a fraction of Ledger’s performance, than fans are in for a wild ride.
While Jonathan Majors will soon become a major household name when Ant-Man 3 opens on February 17th, his blockbuster year is just starting. Creed 3 will be out in just two weeks on March 3rd which means the Majors hype-train won’t even have time to slow down between appearances. While nothing has been confirmed, it’s likely he’ll appear as Kang (or one of his variants) in Loki season 2 when it debuts later this summer.
When watching Jonathan Majors run roughshod over the MCU, just remember, one missed meeting and it could have been very different. But the variant that made it out of the building is in another timeline.
