Black Widow’s O-T Fagbenle Thought Marvel Was Joking About Role

O-T Fagbenle never imagined he’d one day be in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In fact, when he first got the call to audition for Black Widow years ago, the London native thought he was being pranked. In a new profile piece from THR, the upcoming Black Widow star says he thought the initial call was a joke until his girlfriend convinced him to film an audition on an iPhone as the two were on vacation in Mexico at the time.

“I guess I didn’t think it was a real thing. And I was so obsessed with Maxxx,” the actor says of the tape. “After I’d recorded it, I was like, ‘Oh that’s pretty good tape, actually,’ It just escalated again and again and again to the point it was like, ‘Oh my God, like I’m actually going to be in a Marvel movie.’”

Maxxx is an upcoming comedy series for Hulu, one which Fagbenle created and wrote. The series stars Christopher Meloni as a record executive who takes a chance on washed-up boy-band star Maxxx, the character Fagbenle plays. “Maxxx was not a movable thing in my heart,” the actor adds. “It was a scary thing to be faced with the prospect of having to make a Sophie’s choice.”

Though his Black Widow is still being kept under wraps, the actor told ComicBook.com at Comic-Con last summer he acted as a “fixer” of sorts within the world of espionage. There’s a popular fan theory his character is the true identity behind Taskmaster, though that’s been far from confirmed.

“I’m really excited to be part of the Marvel Universe with Scarlett, who’s awesome by the way as you might imagine,” Fagbenle said at the time. “She’s really fun to work with and I get to play this character Mason, who’s kind of a fixer for spies and those in the underworld who need a bit of help. He might be a bit more ambivalent but he has a really complex relationship with Natasha.”

Fagbenle joins Scarlett Johansson, Florence Pugh, Rachel Weisz, and David Harbour in the Cate Shortland film. Thor: Ragnarok scribe Eric Pearson is credited with the screenplay from a story by Jac Schaeffer and Ned Benson.

Black Widow is currently set for release on November 6th.