Vincent D’Onofrio on Turning Into Kingpin, the Legacy of Daredevil, and More

Even though Daredevil has finished its run on Netflix, Vincent D’Onofrio still garners plenty of chatter as one of the most memorable villains to appear in a live-action Marvel property. In fact, a quick trip to social media will show droves and droves of fans who might even rank D’Onofrio’s Wilson Fisk as the best villain in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. We recently spoke with the Daredevil star about his time on the show, quarantine living, and more.

As he tells us, he’s keeping busy in a post-Daredevil world by continuing to work on his craft. Shortly before the coronavirus shut down reached Hollywood, D’Onofrio wrapped a role in a movie alongside Jessica Chastain. In a matter of weeks, he’ll head to Canada to film a series with Viola Davis. On top of everything else, he’s trying to get two movies and another television show of his own produced and out the door. Then, there’s always the hope that one day he’ll eventually return to the screen as Kingpin to terrorizes audiences again.

Keep scrolling to see our entire conversation with D’Onofrio.

Adventures in Babysitting 2

Let’s take a quick segue into Adventures in Babysitting. That VHS tape was played so much in the Barnhardt household growing up. We wore it out. What’s it gonna take for you to do Adventures in Babysitting 2 or a Dawson the Mechanic spinoff?

That was really funny. I don’t know. I have nothing to do with that. I love the cast that was ended on Elizabeth Shues. I consider her a friend and even Thor had a crush on her back then, she was so lovely. She’s still lovely and that movie was really cool. It wasn’t the kind of thing that I wanted to do back then, ’cause I was a serious actor, kind of a thing. But, it was something, I guess, even back then, I was just so aware of the whole comic book world and stuff that, for some people don’t give a shit and some people just think the cool factor is too much to deny when it comes to comics.

I’m one of those guys that just, I’ve never been a huge comic fan. I had comics when I was a kid, but I wasn’t a collector or anything, but the cool factor to me is so high when it comes to superheroes and villains and all that kind of stuff, it always has been. So I guess that kind of kicked in, even when I was young, I was like, “Okay, I don’t see anything wrong with that. “Actually, I think that’s pretty cool.” So I think that’s why I ended up playing Dawson just cause of the cool factor.

Acting & Magic

Absolutely, you’ve been performing, you’ve been acting the vast majority of your life. When was the epiphany you had the moment you realized that it was something you wanted to do for the rest of your life?

I think it was, my father was always involved in theater when I was a kid, but I was a kind of a techie and used to run sound and build sets and run lights and stuff like that. And I never took it in high school or anything like that, but I always had a kind of attraction towards the arts and more than I did sports or anything like that. And I can always draw and think, things came natural for me. Like they do a lot of people in the arts.

I think that I got into magic, and I used to do, I started doing shows and I got to be a very popular magician down in Florida, a really young one, but very popular and I used to make a lot of money as a young man. And so I realized that I had no butterflies on stage and I could actually focus on stage and not be distracted by the audience or any kind of judgment of me or anything like that. And then as I got older, I realized that, if I want it to get the girls maybe magic isn’t the right way to go and I had never studied any instruments or anything, so I thought acting was the next jump. And I just realized that I had to learn how, because I’d seen some people act when I was being a techie. And I’m like, “They’re not very good, “they’re not very good actors, “yet they’re up there and I give them credit for it.” But I thought, I don’t wanna be like that. I wanna, if I’m gonna do it, I wanna be as good as I was doing magic. So I studied, I went and I studied in New York City and studied and studied and studied and studied and like six years later, I got my first professional job in a theater.

That’s amazing.

And shortly after that, I got Full Metal Jacket.

Right, right, right. So a few questions about that. First off, if you’re approached on the street and you’re cornered, do you have a magic trick you could still pull out of your back pocket to save you?

I have a lot, there’s a lot of magic tricks you can do without, with just anything in your pocket. So yeah. If I’m ever backed against the wall and somebody doesn’t believe that I’m a magician, I can definitely prove it to them in seconds.

Full Metal Jacket

One of the first films you’ve ever done is with Stanley Kubrick, right? I’m not sure what else I can say other than “Wow!” I mean, right out of the gates, it can’t get much bigger than that, right?

Not in my case. No, you can’t. I mean, it was an NYU Films, a trauma film, and then Full Metal Jacket was the big feature in my life. And that’s [points to wall behind him] Stanley’s pictures. Stanley’s chair, Matthew Modine. Can you see that?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Matthew Modine took that picture. And then on that side is me wearing Arliss Howard’s glasses laying in the grass. Matthew also took that gave them to me as gifts, years later, this is my office that I’m in and you can’t see it, but I have an actual model of the bug from Men in Black.

Really?

Yes I do, yes.

That’s great. Another phenomenal role, by the way.

Thank you, thank you. I’ve got all kinds of stuff from my career, all around me, all in front of me. So yeah, it was intense. Full Metal Jacket, yeah. Matthew Modine told me about the part. I auditioned with his help, where to send the tape and stuff. He was working before I did, Matthew. He was doing films before me, but we had known each other already from auditions in school and stuff and acting classes and stuff.

Out of 3000, they singled me out and I had to go on tape. I put myself on tape a couple of times, and then he gave me the part, he flew me out and I had to gain a bunch of weight for it and out there in England and it was a trip, man. He was quite a man Stanley Kubrick, quite a man.

That’s great. From beginning to end, obviously back then, you don’t have Zoom. You don’t have Skype. How long was it from audition your first tape till you filmed your first scene?

Oh my God. I mean, I guess surprisingly short, like I guess it would be maybe somewhere between four and five months. I think he wanted me out there. We knew that I was gonna have to gain weight and he wanted me to do it out there. He wanted me around because I had things to learn. I had to learn how to march and do the monkey patrol with the rifles. And I had to learn a lot of things. So I was gaining weight during all that stuff and they were already shooting. It took about a month and a half to get the part, ’cause everything had to be mailed. I had to rent my own equipment.

Cameras were like the size of Volkswagen Beatles back then, and they had a deck that you had to carry around and it was huge. And then to edit that, I had to take it to a friend of mine who was at NYU student who could edit takes out, just edit one, take out of several, and put it on a tape. This is all money, bouncer money, that I earned. And so that was a long process, but eventually I got the part and then it was short, it was probably a month or so, or maybe a little more before I flew out there. And then it was a couple of months before I started working and to gain all the weight. And then yeah. Then I was in, so I would say somewhere around six months, five, six months, I guess is the right way to say it.

Even in a post-Full Metal Jacket world has there…I’m not gonna say regrets…but has there been any hesitation as to whether acting was the right gig for you or once you did Jacket was everything just gravy for you?

The only time I wish I wasn’t in this business is when the assholes show up. I don’t like bigots and I don’t like jerks. And every business has them. And that’s the only time I wish I was in another business because I love what I do. And I love actors and I love directors and I loved producers and I love writers. I mean, there’s some amazingly talented people in all those categories and to be in the middle of a bunch of guys or girls that are on the top of their game, is an awesome experience for an artist. It’s just an awesome experience that kind of collaboration, or to even have a boss that just got it going on, or to be with a fellow actress or actor, that’s just inspiring every take after take, after take that you do. It’s just so much, but every once in a while, somebody in my business will say something or do something and I wish I wasn’t in a business then, but no, as far as regrets, it’s pretty simple really. I’m not sure what, I think it’s very common, this answer. I’m not sure what I would do if I wasn’t an actor, I’d probably be a teacher.

What would you teach?

Acting.

Acting.

Yeah, or art, probably art class or acting class. I mean, I teach now I teach acting a lot, actually all over the world, but especially in New York, I do it for free in between jobs. I do it for different, mostly for the Strasberg Institute in New York and LA, ’cause I studied method acting. And so that’s why I’m really good teaching it now ’cause of my experience. So, but yeah, yeah. Probably something like that.

Absolutely, have you had any opportunities to do that this year with what’s going on? I mean, do you have Zoom classes or anything like that?

So many classes on Zoom.

Have you?

Yes, I have.

I mean, other than the obvious, would there be any surprise difficulties that… I’m sure there’s plenty of difficulties doing that, right?

Well, I mean, I thought it was gonna be really hard to keep their focus, but I do these very intense classes, very intense stuff. I limit my classes to around somewhere around 12 students and it’s every day is a four hour class with one 15 minute break and it’s really intense. And what we do is we build monologues. So everybody brings in a monologue and I take them each of them individually, while everybody’s watching of course, step by step in baby steps and build that monologue into a performance with them, with using the Stanislavski or slash method acting approach.

So I guess my answer is when it comes to Zoom, if it’s a film acting class, which is what it is when you’re building a monologue, it’s just like right now, we’re already in the shot. So it’s acting on film already. And so it actually works. And if it’s a monologue, that means that we don’t really have to deal with any other actors. They have to deal with me. They have to look at me and react to me, but that’s it, and that’s the way it goes. So it kind of works.

Mr. Wonderful & Music

Always perfecting the craft you are. Fast forward a few years from Adventures in Babysitting, and Full Metal Jacket. I do have to ask about one scene in Mr. Wonderful. Okay, the singing scene, are you actually singing “I Say a Little Prayer For You,” or that was ADR?

That was the director Anthony Minghella.

Okay.

He sang that.

He sang that?

That’s his voice, yeah.

Okay, I wasn’t sure if you were a classically trained singer or what, do you enjoy singing?

I can sing and I love to sing, but he did. And he wanted to it to be in a certain pitch and my voice can’t, I can’t do that.

Gotcha, gotcha. Do you have any musicals or anything in the works?

No, but I play a lot of ukulele.

But I have my friends, a lot of my friends are much better musicians than I am, who are also actors, but I do like the ukulele, the one thing I promised myself when I first picked it up and decided to learn how to play it was that I would never play a ukulele song on it because I’m not really big on ukulele songs. So I play everything from blues to country and you can play anything on ukulele. So it’s fun. In fact, me and my daughter just were fooling around and did a duet ’cause she plays as well. And we just did a duet actually, yesterday.

Cool, I am not a musician, so I don’t have anything to add to that.

You should pick one up. They’re really easy to play.

Becoming Kingpin

Awesome, let’s go on to Daredevil, what everyone wants to know around these parts. By the time you’re cast as Wilson Fisk, you’re certainly not a no-name actor by any stretch of imagination, right? Is this something that you were required to still audition for or was it kind of a straight offer?

No, they came to me, yeah. They came to me, it wasn’t an offer. It was a reach out to see if I was interested. And I was like, “Wow,” I was really reluctant to do a show ’cause I had done one for so long on TV with Criminal Intent. And so I was okay with doing like this and that, but I didn’t wanna commit to a whole show. And so I needed the powers that be to understand that I would commit yearly rather than to a long period of time that they would agree to kind of a handshake deal, that they would give me a heads up, whether they needed me or not. And if I wanted to do it, if I wasn’t doing something else, I would clear my schedule and do it for them. So we did this kind of thing where I agreed to do it, according to those kinds of rules.

Once I realized the approach, I’ve made them understand how much I was gonna dive into it. And that I wasn’t gonna, it’s not something I was gonna treat lightly that I knew that once the approach of the show was explained to me and the approach of the character, that they were really looking for, a human being much like the newer Kingpin stuff. I was in and once I was in and I started to produce character for them, it all really went well season to season after that.

That’s great, that’s great. What was there a kind of pitch or what was their major selling point? What got you hooked on the show? Did they send you a batch of scripts, I imagine?

Steven DeKnight and Jeph [Loeb], they sent me the first scripts, which I wasn’t in, but they wanted me to know what the tone was and then tagged along with that was the fact that again, they were looking for a human being, a character that had an emotional life. And I felt really confident that I could deliver that. The thing about, I hit upon the way to play him almost instantly after I read the first script. It just came to me in a very kind of Stanislavsky way.

I found the interior life that he should speak through almost immediately. And I always used that particular choice throughout all three seasons. And so the way his voice is, the way his emotions are, the way his anger is, the way his frustration is all of that honestly, really comes from one choice inside me that I would never tell what it is cause it’s private, but I got it almost immediately and used it all the way through all three seasons to portray the character.

Did you watch the movie?

Which one?

The Daredevil movie.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I take it, you wanted to…it’s all about building your own character, right? Not gleaning from this comic or this movie, or what have you.

I could never do with what the actor in the Daredevil, movie did. He was unique to himself and no, this was like a different, a whole different approach for me. I didn’t consider. The only influence that I had from the comics was the art of that I was drawn to was Bill Sienkiewicz and David Mack, those guys, those two artists, I reached out to both of them and they helped me a lot. I asked them for more of their art or any inspiration they could give me. And they gave me a lot those two, I actually still have. I consider friendships with those two artists, I think they’re amazingly talented. And if you look at their particular art in the runs that they did you’ll understand how they influenced my character.

Inspiration

Absolutely, you say you have friendships with them. Do you have any large pieces around the house? Do you actively collect them?

I have a, hang on a second. This is a David Mack Joker.

Yeah, it is.

Yeah, that is now mine. I have Bill’s stuff hanging in the room. I have a incredible book. I don’t know if you’ve seen the book that Bill put out his art books, amazing. I mean, the guy’s like phenomenal and yeah. So the answer is yes, I have a… Yeah, I’m looking around. I have a lot of other artists too, yeah.

Absolutely, quick segue into Joker, real quick. Do you think like that Hard-R, really grounded thing is something that could float with Kingpin? Do you think that’s something you’d really want to approach someday?

Yeah, I mean, I think that’d be awesome.

Yeah, I feel very close to that character. I do have to say, I do feel like that character is mine and it’s only because I played him for those three seasons and was so close with him. So I do feel very close to that character just for like nostalgic and just connected to that character through my performance. So I think that any offer to play him again would be, I would definitely have a really good look at for sure.

Right, right. I mean, do you feel like it would happen? With I mean the Marvel world, they pump out three movies a year, do you feel it’ll happen? Do you have an idea?

I don’t know, they’re a hard company to figure out, they’ve got a lot on their plate and it’s just too, there’s just too much. I mean, there are so many amazing stories. There’s so much content when it comes to them, they’re a hard company to figure out what they’re gonna do. I just have no idea. And so, is there a speck of hope? Yeah, for sure. In me, yeah, to do it for sure, yeah.

It’s always good to have at least a little hope, right?

Yeah, yeah. I think there’s more to do with him, but you just never know it’s such an intense company. ‘Cause when I think of Marvel, I think of so many storylines, it’s like you think of DC, it’s the same thing. There’s so many stories. I can’t imagine being in that chair trying to figure out which ones are the ones to be told next. And that’s how I look at it, as a creative person. I see it much bigger than just my part. I just see it as these huge opportunities.

Yeah, I just see it as these, there’s so many storylines I wouldn’t wanna be in that chair. There’s so many opportunities to tell amazing stories. So I just hope that someday I’m included. That would be awesome. I would love to play Fisk again.

Possible Storylines

You bring up storylines here. You’re writing and you’re getting into filmmaking behind the camera. Are there any Fisk-related or Daredevil-related storylines that haven’t been done? You’d like to see any that stand out to you?

Not really. I mean, other than the one, the obvious one, which is Daredevil, I still believe in Charlie Cox as Daredevil, And I think that if they do a Daredevil film or have a Daredevil, in one of their films. I think I only hope that it’s Charlie, because I believe in him as Daredevil, I loved working with that guy. Not just because he’s a great guy, but because he’s a fine actor.

A lot of people, I guess they don’t realize because they’re not actors that what it’s like to be on set with somebody that’s good, really good. And it’s a whole different experience than it is when you’re with somebody that’s, eh. Charlie was on it every day. We were together on it all the time, which brings us both up a notch.

Right, absolutely.

So I only think that there’s so much to explore with Charlie and Daredevil, and whether Fisk is in it or not. And yeah. I mean, that’s really the only, as far as I go, just film stuff that I’ve been involved.

Right, did you two have to screen test at all? Or you were both cast and you just got to work.

Yeah.

Very cool.

I remember even Ayelet Zurer plays Vanessa. I remember the first day before this first day that we went in for our final costume fittings and stuff. And I think we were gonna work like the next day for like one little scene together. And I got on the phone and it was the guys from Los Angeles who were running the show and they were like, “Well, we just wanted to call and wish you guys luck and hope that you feel confident, we want you to feel confident and know that we trust you,” and on and on. And they said, “So how do you guys, how do you feel?” And I said, Ayelet and I who hit it off immediately. Her and I, and just kinda looked at her and I said, “Well, guys, we’re just going to look at each other in the eyes and speak to truth.” I think we’ll be okay. And we went on and we did exactly that. Ayelet did it in her Vanessa way and I did it in my Fisk way and it all worked out fine.

Heads + Car Doors

One of the first moments I think many would consider that shows kind of just how dangerous Wilson Fisk is the car door scene, right? Everyone talks about the car door scene. Your first reaction, reading that in the script. What was your initial reaction?

Yeah, my first reaction was, “kay, this is the show I thought it was gonna be. We really are gonna go for it.” And I checked with everybody to make sure that I wasn’t gonna show up. And then they were gonna like soften it up. And everybody’s like, “Hell no, this is it. We’re going all the way.” And so that made me feel really confident ’cause that kind of matched my approach to the character in a kind of real kind of emotional way.

That scene to me, even though it’s this horrific event and I wouldn’t wish it on anybody. It matches the horror inside Fisk, his emotional life. So it was well suited for this character. I thought it was amazing and well-acted by everybody in the scene and the stunts guys are amazing. I mean, I reacted that my reaction was, Oh, this is good. This is what really what I thought that it was gonna be, it made me maybe happy actually.

Oh, you bring up the stunts guys. The hallway fights are kind of a big thing in the whole Daredevil world. Were you hoping to get your own 15-minute, one-take fight scene at some point?

What goes on those sets is crazy. I mean, it’s just crazy. Those guys, the stunt teams are just, they just go in there and they just wreck shit. It’s like unbelievable. It’s all planned out. But yet, that final scene that we shot in episode three, I mean in season three, the one that happened, the big fight scene between Bullseye and Daredevil and Fisk, it’s huge choreographed scene with people jumping off of balconies and thrown up and backs broken against the walls and just insane stuff.

And being tapped out and you’re getting your guy to come in and take your place for a few punches and then tapping back in and take them back over the rotation of actor to stunt man from actor to stunt man is this continuous thing that happens sometimes while the cameras roll, we’re replacing each other and all these stunts is choreography that’s pretty cool and pretty exhausting. And to carry all that weight around.

I’ve taken the weight back off that I had on for Fisk and carry that weight around it’s intense, your legs have to be really strong and you have to be pretty agile. So you never get hurt. You don’t pull anything or break anything. Which was, I was fortunate not to, but it’s intense, it’s intense, Charlie and his team, doing those long hallway scenes and even in even Bernthal and stuff in the prison that he did and season two, it’s intense stuff. I mean, it’s what you see is what’s happening on set, which is why to me it’s so incredible to watch, ’cause there’s no difference. You’re like, “Oh, I see it’s movie magic.” No, it’s not, it’s not movie magic. It’s stunts, pure stunts.

Year by Year

There’s still plenty of work to be had. You mentioned the weight. Now, Full Metal Jacket, Stanley recommended that, was that also a recommendation here? Or is that something you thought would add more to the character Fisk?

Well, he’s big, he’s really big. I mean, I’m a big dude anyway, but he’s like super big, and I’m six-four, I’m not like six-seven or anything. And so I had to get my neck thicker, my face bigger, I had the have hulk, and that’s the only really way it would work. And I didn’t wanna have to deal with padding every day and all that kind of stuff. And I’m a big dude, so kind of works out.

Absolutely, you mentioned earlier, you only wanted the role or you were interested in that role if they let you do season by season stuff. I mean, seasons one and three are pretty Fisk heavy whereas two it’s a much smaller role. Was that pure story-wise or did that involve some issues with you and scheduling and such?

No, I think that’s what they came up with and I was happy they did because it allowed me to do other things. But I think that their main thing was to bring in John to bring in Punisher, and start that off. And then they wanted the arc for Kingpin was when he, to show him become sort of, not really the Kingpin yet, but the guy who could reach further than you imagined, he could reach through prisons through every criminal in New York and beyond.

They needed that to go into a further, to go further with his character so that whisk, Fisk, sorry. So that Fisk could eventually become the Kingpin in season three. He had to be forming into it in season two. And so those scenes plus to bring in the Punisher were really important to season two. And that’s why he was in it.

Speaking of season three, the thing with Daredevil, that might be different than some other shows is there’s a new creative team behind each season. When did you first talk to Erik [Oleson] and the team about coming back for season three?

I don’t remember. I think he reached out to me. I hope that these days, at least that writers, I know that Steven DeKnight and the writers of the second season I’m pretty sure that they understand that I depend a lot on the writing, and I really do believe that it’s, unless it’s written well, I can’t do a good performance. It’s just not possible. I’ve tried in my career and you just can’t, you can do an okay performance, but it’s gotta be written perfect to do that, to do a great performance or something near that great. So I think Eric really wanted to discuss the whole arc of the third season with me. And we did, we did over a few weeks, discussed it. And when we met in person, he’s such a likable dude. But I hadn’t seen his writing yet.

Once I started to get scenes and stuff like that, I was like, so jazzed, he just knocked it out the park scene after scene, after scene. And I was like, “Okay, this guy’s got it going on. This guy’s amazing.” And it’s reminiscent of how I felt with Steven DeKnight, who was, those monologues in that first season, they were just perfection in the context of Fisk, they were perfection. And so Erik was coming up with all this incredible iconic stuff. I mean, Oleson’s the shit, man. He just got going on, he said that we need to knock it out of the park in the third season. And that’s exactly how we all felt about it. I depend a lot on those guys, I really do. And I’m the kind of actor that, I don’t change a word, I don’t go on set and then change a bunch of stuff. I’ll help change things before we get to set. If I think they need to change, I don’t do that on set. So it’s got to be set unless we’re doing of course, unless you’re doing an improvisational piece, but we weren’t doing that.

We were doing real scenes with real dialogue and just amazing. I’m always in awe of great writing. Oleson, he’s gonna be hugely successful.

Monologuing

Absolutely, you brought up the monologues. There’s the Good Samaritan one at the end of season season, which everyone thinks is the best thing in the Marvel world. And then you mentioned earlier how you’re doing them for charity and such. Was that a recommendation on your part or did DeKnight just recognize your ability to do said monologues and scripted this whole thing out in the script?

I don’t know. It’s a good question. I don’t know. I think, I don’t know, actually you’d have to ask Steven, I really don’t know. I just know that Steven and I did some talking early on, back and forth when it came to character and the creation of the character and the origin of the character and all that. But once we got past that stage, it was just Stephen. I have nothing to do with it. I put my total trust in him and he just knocked these things out. He delivered that monologue maybe a few days before I had shot it. And I was like, “Holy cow.”

When something’s written well, it just comes out your mouth. As long as you have some kind of emotional life going inside you, those words just, they just fall out of your mouth. You don’t even have to try. Your acting is really just where you is just being in the moment and having some kind of real emotion that the words are coming through, but you don’t have to act out the words in any way when they’re written well, they just come out and they just land. Boom, boom, boom. Just like that. And every time. I don’t know why he produced these monologues. I don’t know. I don’t know how much he studied my career or my ability to do stuff. I have no idea.

Right, how long does it take for you to prepare for one of these? ‘Cause you just said you don’t change any words and we’re talking about three, four minutes of talking. How long did it take you to prepare for say the good Samaritan scene?

I mean, I can learn. I’m pretty good. I think that when I was doing Criminal Intent, the Law and Order show that I did for like nine years, I think the one thing, it was just a couple of things that, that show taught me. One is to never work those kinds of hours again. And the other was, another one was what good writing was, what bad writing was, ’cause we had a lot of good writing on that show. And the third one was, it increased my chops. I was better at retaining dialogue and learning it quicker.

It exercised my brain so much over those years that these days I can learn a two-minute monologue, which is a long monologue. I can learn it in two hours. I can learn it in two hours and then feel confident doing it a few times until I get it right. It’s like that it’s a process for me. I just consider it an experiment, really. Like, I’ll learn it, retain it. And then I do a little homework on it so that I know where I’m supposed to be when I’m performing it. And then it’s just a few takes to just, one of them works.

I never try and repeat myself. I always start at zero. I just start, I don’t try and reach to something I did in the last take, or I don’t do anything like that. I know I’m confident enough because of my years and all actors will get gain this eventually, all the ones that I know anyway that you just forget the last take and you just go again. And you’re just confident that it’s gonna land, eventually it’s gonna land. And so the learning of it is not the, it just takes the homework. You just have to do it. and you need a couple hours but you have to be well-practiced, it doesn’t come natural. Not for me it didn’t anyway.

Daredevil, Kingpin, and all these characters certainly are with a TV show where you get the ability to explore these characters, their character studies, and the nuance involved with all these characters. I mean, do you think Fisk and Murdock and such could lend themselves to a film that will do the characters justice? I guess what I’m saying is, would you prefer returning on film or TV with Fisk?

I think either, or I think all the actors that were in that — Deborah [Ann Woll] who by the way is just in my books, she can do no wrong that actress, she’s just phenomenal — I’m thinking of the cast as you say that, and there’s not one person in that cast. I don’t think couldn’t carry a film. I mean, I think they all could carry a film and make a film work. So my answer is, I think we could certainly make another television show work. And I definitely think all those actors have the chops to sell those characters in a film. So either way. But I love the actors. And so, and those actors I worked with for two seasons. So I’m biased towards them a lot.

There’s a lot, a lot of people that agree fully with you. You’ve met the #SaveDaredevil people.

Yeah, of course, yeah. I’ve loved them from when they first started.

Wrestling

I’m not sure how in tune you are with the world of professional wrestling and the WWE. You mentioned earlier, how Fisk you feel is your character and now the wrestler Big Show has come out, I think earlier this month, and said he would be a shoe-in for the role of Wilson Fisk. So I do have to pose one, what do you think about those comments and two, do you feel strongly enough about the role you’d be willing to step in the ring with Big Show to wrestle for the role?

No, I wouldn’t wrestle that guy I don’t know very much about him. I’ve seen the picture of him and stuff, so no, I would not wrestle with him because I would lose that and then lose the character. I think I would just say this, that I believe in actors and I believe an actor should have a shot at whatever they want to try and do, that’s what I think. If that guy wants to play Kingpin, then fucking go after Kingpin, give it your all, that’s what I would say. That’s what I would hope he would say to me too.

I mean, I think it’s awesome that he’s even saying the things he’s saying, I think it’s ambitious and it’s good attitude to have.

Alright, if not Kingpin, do you have another comic character you’d love to try?

All right, there’s so many. You have to remember, I was never a comic book collector, so I’m not able to just spit out names of characters and some might, in the end, I don’t even know if were DC or Marvel actually. My sons know a hell of a lot more about it than I do. But, when I read a script, it’s all either I’m either gonna like the character or I’m not, or it’s gonna have some kind of I’m gonna be able to relate to it. Like I did with Fisk because I knew a Fisk already or something like that. I mean, I don’t know. I mean, I’m sure there is, I don’t really like off the top of my head.

Right, I hear you. With your sons, do you guys typically go to the Marvel movies? Have you seen most of them?

We always go to the Marvel movies. We’ve seen al of them, yeah.

What’s your favorite? I know you said you wanted to work with Taika Waititi before. Does that means Thor: Ragnarok might be your favorite or?

I mean, I just like him as a filmmaker and I like him when he dives into the Marvel stuff. And so that would be really fun. I would love that, we go see them all. I mean, Infinity War was the shit.

Outside of Marvel

What else are you working on? Can you share anything? You said you’re doing some writing as such.

Yeah, yeah. So the film that’s already in the can is The Eyes of Tammy Faye, with Jessica Chastain and Andrew Garfield. I play Reverend Jerry Falwell in that, and so that’s already in the can when that’s coming out. I don’t know yet. Everything is kind of weird right now ’cause of what we’re going through. So that was the last one I was able to get into the can it wasn’t that long ago.

I have to go to Canada in a couple of weeks and finish the Sandra Bullock Netflix project that I was doing with Viola Davis.

As far as my stuff, I’m not gonna tell you exactly what they’re about, but we have three things in development one’s a TV show. And then there are two films that I have in development. The two films are for me that I hope to direct and not be in. And then the television show it’s for me to be in and to produce along with another company, which I can’t really talk about right now, but we already have the company that wants to be involved and all that. So that’s all moving forward. The films are always, when you haven’t directed a lot of films. And well, even if you have, filmmaking is a really slow process if you’re developing a story, an original story, that’s not taken from a novel or anything. And so it’s fun and it’s interesting to develop them, but it does take a long time to get it all the way through.

Right, right, right. Would you consider any of those a passion project? Is there one thing you wanted to develop your whole entire life you haven’t gone to yet?

One of them is, they’re both passion projects because I believe in them, I believe what they’re about a lot and what they’re about a lot, but one of them, in particular, is something I’ve been wanting to do for, I guess, 15 years just to direct it and write it and direct it. And it’s finally, we have a good writer and we’re doing it now, we’re writing it now. So it’s going well.

Absolutely, I know you shouted out the New York food bank earlier. You did the monologues for them. Any other charitable work you’re involved in anything else you wanna shout out?

The Queens Theater in New York, I teach there, I teach disabled actors there and it’s kind of everything’s at a standstill right now because of the whole COVID situation. But once we’re in the clear we’ll go back to doing that, it’s a program called The Theater For All, and they need donations. And so if anybody is in New York and wants to donate to them, you can get online and do that. And yeah, right now, those are my two things.

*****

All three seasons of Daredevil are now streaming on Netflix.

What’s your favorite D’Oonfrio role? Think it over and let us know your thoughts in the comments section or by tweeting our writer @AdamBarnhardt to chat all things Marvel!

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