“Captain Marvel”: Press Conference Quotes
Prior to its March 8 release, the cast and creators of “Captain Marvel” gathered in Los Angeles to discuss the making, importance and Easter eggs of Marvel’s first female solo film.
On hand was producer Kevin Feige, writers/directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, Brie Larson (Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel), Samuel L. Jackson (Nick Fury), Jude Law (Yon-Rogg), Lashana Lynch (Maria Rambeau), Gemma Chan (Minn-Erva) and Clark Gregg (Phil Coulson).
The conference kicked off with Larson discussion why she took on the role of Captain Marvel.
Brie Larson: “There’s a lot to love about her, which is why I was really excited to do this…. I was a little worried about playing a superhero that would be perfect, because I don’t that that’s realistic or something aspirational at all…. Getting to play a character where the whole character arc and turn of this is watching her be this major risk taker which means it’s not always going to work out for the best … I mean that’s everything. That’s for everybody.”
Larson went on to discuss the epic training regimen (including pushing a Jeep) that she undertook to embody Carol Danvers.
Larson: “For me the main reason for doing it was so that in moments like when we’re talking about Carol’s strength and we’re talking about what I learned from her, it’s that I’m stronger than I realized…. I can stand here and say that I am really strong… So this concept when it comes to gender norms of what the human body is capable of, and particularly what a female body is capable of, it’s capable of a lot.”
Samuel L. Jackson and Kevin Feige talked about taking a character played for over a decade and rewinding to imagine Nick Fury 25 years ago.
Jackson: “He’s sort of a kinder, gentler, not so cynical about the world we’re in Nick Fury who hadn’t met anyone from another universe just yet…. It’s kind of fun to not be the all-knowing, angry persuader that Nick Fury always is. It was even more refreshing to have two eyes so I didn’t have to cover one eye when I was learning my lines.
Feige: “The technology is spectacular and we’ve done it in a number of films and I think this represents the peak. However, the two people up here who we did do it to –Sam Jackson and Clark Gregg– are the two human beings on earth who don’t need it. I urge you to Google them in 1995 and it’s almost identical, so we saved a lot of money.”
Lashana Lynch discussed her role as a revolutionary Air Force pilot and joining the seemingly all encompassing list of Hollywood stars in the MCU.
Lynch: “I am a Marvel fan, I’ve grown up watching them and loving the characters. I just had a feeling that something would come up…. Yeah, I campaigned, of course I did!”
On the relationship of Maria Rambeau and Carol Danvers, Lynch said: “They both are military, they both are from male dominate environments where needed to find [power and connections]. So I feel like they just had a sarcasm together…. Maria embodies that in a very human way, she’s able to just be a kind, good person.”
Larson: “I think that that’s a really tight knit bond they have, and they are family…. That’s just the love of the movie, this is the great love, this is the love lost, this is the love found again, this is the reason to continue fighting and to go to the end of the earth for the person, the thing that you love. And it’s her best friend and her best friend’s daughter, and I think it’s so natural… It’s like the movie shifts when [Lynch] is on screen because there’s a level of power that she commands in that.”
Finally, Anna Boden talked about working with the movie’s breakout star, a cat named Reggie.
Boden: “There’s something about getting a cat to just do what he normally does, and it was part of the struggle of having a very well trained, very directable cat on screen was that sometimes we just wanted him to do the random thing that a cat is going to do…. There’s something about the spontaneity of what an animal can do.
“Captain Marvel” opens in theaters on March 8.
