Marvel

Marvel’s Hawkeye Star Alaqua Cox Opens Up About Landing Echo Role

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Alaqua Cox is weeks away from becoming a superstar. Despite having had no acting experience whatsoever — save for a background role in a high school play — Cox stars opposite Jeremy Renner in Marvel’s Hawkeye. Ahead of the show’s premiere, the actor got a sitdown with People magazine in which she got to rave about her character Maya Lopez — known better around these parts as the superhero Echo.

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“It’s crazy how much my life has already changed because I was a college dropout,” Cox told the magazine. “I worked at a factory. I’m so excited to show people who I am and what I can do, what anybody can do.”

The actor was actually working in an Amazon center when friends noticed Marvel Studios was casting for the show.

They saw the casting call looking for a Native American actress and female deaf actress,” she added. “It just matched so perfectly, so I decided to go for it. I had never seen anybody on the screen that maybe looked like me … deaf, an amputee,”

As the standard with Marvel projects, Cox didn’t speak to the content of Hawkeye. She did, however, praise Renner. “I think he’s one of the coolest guys,” she said. “I learned a lot from him.”

Just last week, Marvel Studios announced the first two episodes of Hawkeye would premiere at once. Cox and Renner are starring alongside Hailee Steinfeld, who’s playing the beloved Marvel ar\cher Kate Bishop.

“As far as the comics go, yes,” Steinfeld answered when asked if she’s been catching up on Marvel history. “Again, it’s kind of like Emily and her poetry: having this world of endless information. I’ve always loved comics. I’ve always been a very visual person, and a large book with anything over 200-250 pages has always intimidated me, so comics have always been something I’ve been drawn to because of the visual aspect of it. So I’ve had so much fun reading these comics, and going through them and discovering these elements of Kate Bishop that are in there that we’re bringing to life in the show, and other elements of the comics.”

Hawkeye debuts on Disney+ on November 24th.

What other characters do you hope to see pop up in Hawkeye? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section or by hitting our writer @AdamBarnhardt up on Twitter to chat all things MCU!

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