Vincent D’Onofrio Talks Coming to Disney Marvel Production After Netflix Daredevil

Vincent D’Onofrio is one of a handful of actors who have had the experience of playing the same Marvel Comics character both inside and outside of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The actor, who began on Netflix’s Daredevil series in the role of Wilson Fisk/Kingpin before transitioning to Hawkeye in the same role, has managed to become one of Marvel’s most-loved villains, and did most of it without the benefit of tying directly into the events of Marvel’s big tentpole blockbusters. But how did the two experiences compare?

The Marvel/Netflix collaborations were hard PG-13 or soft-R shows for the most part, if you were to translate them into movie ratings. Themes of torture, sexual abuse, and lots of bone-crunching violence took place in them, setting them apart from the kind of CGI punch-ups that are common in Marvel’s all-ages-friendly superhero content. Still, they were beloved, and the casting was pretty great, so fans had been hoping to see how actors like D’Onofrio and Daredevil star Charlie Cox would carry over into the MCU’s house style.

“I think the [different] tones are obvious,” D’Onofrio told ComicBook. “I think it’s less bloody. We talked a lot about it, and for me, it’s not a worry, because if I ever get the chance to take it further with the MCU, then I’m going to do the same work I did on Daredevil, like I did in Hawkeye. [Fisk is] about emotional brutality, and he is just a mess. He’s a broken monster, and he is capable of many different kinds of brutality…so none of that worried me during Hawkeye. I did notice obviously that there’s less blood and there’s less torture. The thing you have to do is, you have to stay away from torture, and that really cuts things down. A lot of baddies that you play, they’re not just baddies, but they also actually torture people. They get control of them, and torture, and that’s too hardcore. So that’s out for Hawkeye, and hopefully something will happen after this.”

During the interview, ComicBook’s Kofi Outlaw noted that using the Daredevil actor brought a meta quality to the character, carrying over some of the dread that audiences felt from his appearances in the much darker Netflix series.  

“Best case scenario for me is that that does exist, but that’s up to me to carry in,” D’Onofrio said. “I need to carry that in. When you see Wilson Fisk, it needs to make you uneasy, no matter what’s happening, [even if] he’s dressed in that ‘Family Business’ costume that I was in, the Hawaiian shirt.”

You can see all the seasons of Daredevil on Netflix. Hawkeye is now streaming on Disney+.