Paul Rudd plays a significant role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Ant-Man. However, people reacted amusingly when he told them he would be playing the superhero.
In 3 solo films and several appearances in other Marvel titles, actor Paul Rudd has taken on the role of the superhero Ant-Man.
In a conversation with Marvel colleague Chris Evans (Captain America) as part of Variety’s Actors on Actors format, the actor talked about how people reacted when he told them about his role in the MCU.
Here is a trailer for the latest Ant-Man movie:
“I’m not the first person people think of when it comes to playing a big superhero”
Paul Rudd mentioned that many people didn’t initially know who Ant-Man was when he told them he had gotten the role in the MCU.
So, the actor explained the character’s unusual superhero abilities: “He can shrink to the size of an ant, but he retains his strength and can also control ants and talk to them.”
Here you can see the whole YouTube video with Paul Rudd and Chris Evans. If you want to hear what Paul Rudd said about his Ant-Man role, jump to 33:00:
While Paul Rudd explained this, Chris Evans also laughed at how absurd the explanation sounded. As the actor further recounted, it wasn’t just the hero’s abilities that made people laugh when they learned about his role.
Also, the fact that Paul Rudd, who was known more as a comedy guy (Anchorman), was playing a superhero contributed to the reaction. However, the actor used that to embody a character with whom people could identify:
I’m not the first person people think of when it comes to playing a big superhero […]
I wanted to try to create a character, a superhero, who is a kind of normal person. The whole superhero world seemed overwhelming to me, and I wondered, “What do you do with it?” to make it relatable.
Paul Rudd via Variety
Anyone who has ever wondered how Ant-Man actually goes to the bathroom can find here in an interview with our Filmstarts colleagues with Paul Rudd the answer.
The actor also added that he felt a lot of pressure to live up to the expectations of comic fans who already knew a lot about Ant-Man:
“These characters are very important to many people, and you want to treat them with respect and enrich the character. And of course, the character – as created by Jack Kirby, Stan Lee, and everyone at Marvel – has been around for quite some time.”
Another actor in the MCU actually wanted to land the hero role but ended up with an iconic villain role:
“Loki” never auditioned for his role, he actually wanted to be the hero
