Ethan Hawke Interview: Moon Knight | Screen Rant
As the Marvel Cinematic Universe progresses through Phase 4, its ever-growing roster of characters continues to grow thanks to a slate of TV shows made for Disney+. The studio's latest offering is Moon Knight, starring Oscar Isaac as the titular character. Now streaming, the limited series also features Ethan Hawke as the character of Arthur Harrow. This project marks something of a change-of-pace for Hawke, best known for films like the Before trilogy and Training Day.
Screen Rant spoke with Hawke to discuss what made Moon Knight perfect for his MCU debut, Isaac's pitch to him, and much more.
Screen Rant: I just love you in the MCU, and I think it's something that fans have been fan-casting you in for a long time. Why was this the right role, and how many roles have you turned down in the past?
Ethan Hawke: I don't know. I've been acting for a long time, and I've turned down some roles I shouldn't have, and I've tried to get roles that I didn't get.
This one seemed right, mostly because I love the way that it happened to me: having Oscar pitch me on it and seeing the fire in his eyes to play this part. In general, I thought, "If he has this kind of fire to do this, it has a chance of being special."
We owe Oscar a thank you card. What exactly did he say? What was the hook?
Ethan Hawke: I don't know if it was any specific words. I've been doing this so long, and you get a feeling when somebody's for real. He was scared. It's a big dare; it's a jump off a high dive to play a new character and to play a new superhero in the Marvel lexicon, as it were. To play one that's mentally broken, and to really take on that challenge of multiple personality and be a hero. Mental illness is often used to create villains, but not often to create heroes.
When he started talking about that, I got really interested. I remember my favorite thing about the first Iron Man was just what a wonderful performance Robert Downey gave inside the spectacle of a superhero movie. It was a real performance, and I could tell Oscar wanted to do that. He was gonna use this opportunity to give a performance, and I thought I could be his Jeff Bridges.
Arthur Harrow is very charming and enticing. I'm like, "Man, would I join this cult? Probably."
Ethan Hawke: Come to me, come to me. We'll heal the world together.
A lot of people are wondering, is this based on anybody that's on the page or is this an all-new character? Were you given any of that information?
Ethan Hawke: What was wonderful about it is that there was no definitive Moon Knight villain, so I could really create one. I had conversations with Oscar about it, and I had conversations with Mohamed about it. I had a long talk with Kevin Feige about what the show needed.
Because one version is, "Well, what do I want to play?" But that's not very helpful if you don't know in what context. What does the story need? If the story has a broken and unbalanced person, it needs a very even and balanced villain. I started building off that idea.
When you step on the set for the first time, what is that moment like? I feel like no matter how seasoned you are, on a Marvel set you're like, "Wow!"
Ethan Hawke: That is true. And honest with you, I really didn't expect it. But the set was huge, and there had been so much money and work and preparation that went into creating the space for you to act in. It was a little bit like stepping into the Colosseum at Rome or something. You just felt like, "Wow, I guess I'm supposed to do something."
Every toy, every camera that you could possibly think of, they had ready to go. The costumes had been worked out to a T, and there's a certain amount of pressure that you can feel about that. You have to just break through it, but I was actually nervous.
Moon Knight is now streaming on Disney+. New episodes debut on Wednesdays.