Kraven the Hunter: Russell Crowe's Role Reportedly Revealed
Russell Crowe joined the cast of Sony's Kraven the Hunter movie earlier this month and it looks like his role may have finally been revealed. A new report suggests Crowe will be playing Nikolai Kravinoff, the father of the eponymous Spider-Man villain. The report comes from The Illuminerdi, which suggests Crowe may have a pretty sizable role in the feature.
In the Marvel source material, Kravinoff is the father of both Kraven and Chameleon, the latter being a kid the Russian had out of wedlock. Kraven is being played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson while Sony just cast Fred Hechinger (White Lotus) to star as Chameleon.
Kraven has long been a character filmmakers have wanted to bring into live-action, with Spider-Man writer Chris McKenna previously revealing he and his writing partner Erik Sommers have included the character in a draft for every script of their MCU trilogy.
"I don't think there's been a draft of any of the Spider-Man movies where Kraven the Hunter [wasn't the villain]," McKenna said to TheWrap. "...we ended the movie, the last movie with Peter's identity being spoiled by Mysterio, and that was our jumping-off point because at least we could cling to that. That led us down different story roads that were not this story. And then, I think, I don't know if it was Kevin's idea, the idea of doing something with the other villains and teasing at the very end of this, almost in a tag, was floated."
He added elsewhere, "Before the whole idea of this movie, there were other ideas. Because we don't come with any ideas, we all sat at the table once the ink was drying with the Sony/Marvel deal, and all we had was, we ended the movie, the last movie with Peter's identity being spoiled by Mysterio, and that was our jumping-off point because at least we could cling to that," McKenna said.
Kraven the Hunter will be in theaters on January 13, 2023.
What other characters do you hope to see pop up in the Kraven movie? Let us know your thoughts either in the comments section or by hitting our writer @AdamBarnhardt up on Twitter to chat all things Marvel!