If you hear Oscar Isaac speaking English with a British accent in the first few minutes of “Moon Knight” you’re not wrong. His character, Steven Grant, lives in London and works in a museum gift shop with Egyptian relics. He is also the American Marc Spector. And the superhero Moon Knight. All under the same skin.
The Marvel series premiering Wednesday on the Disney+ streaming service takes a fresh approach to mental health by featuring a psychologically challenged man as its hero. And it comes at a time when the pandemic has made many view these problems with greater empathy.
“Until recently, it felt like the topic (of mental health) had been approached in general in a very sensational way, especially when it was done in fiction, in movies, for sure, and in general in action movies. The crazy guy is always the bad guy,” Isaac said in a recent video call interview from the United States.
“In our situation the villain is the sane, calm and collected one, and our superhero is the one who is struggling with intense mental trauma and anguish, and I think that also tells us that being the survivor of this is super heroic.” , he pointed.
On the tape, Steven begins to have disconcerting dreams in which he is being chased and has to fight for his life. This causes him a lot of anguish and confusion, because he begins to realize that not everything is as he thinks and that perhaps there is something that he does not remember. Meanwhile, he begins to have visions and dialogues with the Egyptian god Khonshu.
“When things start to go wrong, you really feel connected to him and you feel like you could be the one going through it,” Isaac said of Steven.
To play three characters in one, focus and teamwork was essential for the Guatemalan-American actor in the six-part miniseries produced by Kevin Feige and Argentine Marvel executive Victoria Alonso.
“It felt like a very collaborative process,” Isaac said. “Kevin, everyone at Marvel, the directors, they really brought me in and allowed me to be a part of every aspect of the shoot. That meant that every morning, when I had to go to the set, I was dying to get there; there was always something to solve. This is really the first time I’ve been in a situation like this and it helped a lot.”
Alonso, president of physical production and post-production, visual effects and animation production at Marvel, singled out Isaac for his acting range.
“Having worked with him is really wonderful,” he told the AP in New York. “It’s the best interpretation we can have of a character with multiple personalities. Seeing him in all of his talent has been a gift.”
The series was mainly shot in Budapest and in the Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, with some scenes in the United States and additional shots in London and Cairo. Egyptian director and producer Mohamed Diab, who participated in all six episodes, strove to achieve adequate representation of his country.
The cast features Egyptian actress May Calamawy and American actors F. Murray Abraham and Ethan Hawke, the latter as the villainous Arthur Harrow.
“He is always the hero. I think it’s because he has so much integrity as a human being,” Isaac said of Hawke. “It was a pretty big risk for both of us, because neither of us had done anything like that before, so having someone to lean on is wonderful.”
In recent days, Isaac, whose credits include the role of Duke Leto Atreides in the Oscar-winning film “Dune” (“Dune”) and that of Resistance commander Poe Dameron in the “Star Wars” saga, has had moments of celebration and also of indignation.
Celebrating this weekend because, in addition to awards for “Dune” as best cinematography and original music, his former classmate and recent co-star in the miniseries “Scenes from a Marriage” (“Secrets of a marriage”), Jessica Chastain, won the Oscar for best actress for her role as a televangelist in “The Eyes of Tammy Faye” (“The eyes of Tammy Faye”).
“She was a few generations above me at Juilliard,” Isaac said of his years at the prestigious American arts school. “She is one of the best, one of the greatest of all time. She is amazing in ‘Tammy Faye’”.
And outrage, because despite the protests of personalities like him, Mark Hamill, Wanda Sykes, Shawn Mendes, Ariana Grande and Chastain herself, who took advantage of the Oscar platform to address the issue, this week Governor Ron DeSantis promulgated in Florida, the state where Isaac grew up, the law known as “Don’t say gay.”
The law prohibits sex and gender identity education from preschool through third grade. The move has been criticized nationally by those who say it marginalizes the LGBT+ community.
“It’s weaponizing a law to terrorize teachers, that’s what it’s really about, and cowards are hiding behind kids to terrorize teachers,” Isaac said. “It’s a chaos that will be demand, after demand, after demand, because what happens if the teacher says ‘my husband runs the marathon’? … It is a shame”.