Men in Black: International’s Kayvon Novak Talks Playing Multiple Roles and Bringing a Beard to Life

The Men in Black franchise has always had a knack for creating zany and likable, yet surprisingly human aliens. Extra-terrestrial beings that look just like someone you’d run into on the subway on the surface, but after peeling back just a single layer they reveal so much more hiding in plain sight. From Tony Shalhoub’s Jeebs to Michael Stuhlbarg’s Griffin, these almost-human characters have become a staple of the entire franchise, and that trend continues in Men in Black: International.

What We Do in the Shadows star Kayvan Novak plays Nasr in the most recent film in the series, a bearded man with an affinity for motorcycles that crosses paths with Agent M and Agent H in Men in Black: International. It doesn’t take long for the character to reveal his big secret: That his beard is actually another living creature, one that operates with its own mind and has a much smarter mouth. A jack-of-all-trades performer, Novak also brought to life the enormous alien Vungus in the first act of the film.

With Men in Black: International now available on Blu-ray and Digital HD, ComicBook.com spoke to Novak about his multiple roles in the movie, and how it felt bring a beard to life.

ComicBook: Tell me a little bit about your experience joining Men in Black: International.

Kayvan Novak: Well, I was super excited to be allowed into the new Men In Black. Super excited to be working with Thor and also F. Gary Gray, who I was a fan of and he’s just super brilliant guy and I was so happy to be working with him. I was also super excited to be doing my first motion capture part. I’d never done motion capture before. All my character work previously had been kind of heavy prosthetics. So that was cool. Got to wear some light craft, got to have some dots drawn on my face, got to do silly voices. Oh this is heaven.

And you got to play an actual, living beard.

Playing a beard was surprisingly easy for me. Because I have a beard, so also I think sometimes people meet me and all they really see is the beard anyway. So you know, to some people I’m just a beard as it is, especially at airports. But yeah it was surprisingly easy to play a beard.

And they let me play it with a kind of gruff New York accent, which is cool, because I’ve always been a fan of Scorsese, so I finally managed to bust out my best New York twang.

What was it like playing off of yourself, going back and forth between your full-size and beard characters?

I was there in the motion capture suit for Vungus, with all the bells and whistles. And then when it was me they just kind of gave me a beard extension, so there again and then yeah, with a beard that was just kind of me and a sound booth with some video kind of saying stuff to sync. So a variety of fun challenges on this and super kind of eye opening, because this is the first kind of huge budget, sci-fi, blockbuster, Hollywood movie I’ve worked on. So yeah that was super excited and also the pressure’s on you to deliver the goods otherwise into the dustbin of history you shall go.

What initially drew you to this project? Were you a big fan of the original trilogy coming in?

Yeah, I was a fan of the first one, but I hadn’t really watched any, I’d kind of the first one was the one I loved. And other than that it was just working with Tessa Thompson, Chris Hemsworth and F Gary Gray really that I was excited about.

Men in Black: International is now available on Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital HD.