Echo's Vincent D'Onofrio Breaks Down Kingpin's Best Scene

The highly anticipated return of Kingpin (Vincent D'Onofrio) to the Marvel Cinematic Universe took place in the first season of Echo, showing the character's rise from the dead after being shot in Hawkeye. Though the character's presence steals the scene anytime he appears on-screen, one scene in particular is one that stood out to many. As the show is wrapping up its finale, Maya Lopez (Alaqua Cox) uses her newfound powers to make Kingpin see his own memories and deal with his trauma head-on. The move is something that resulted in a raw and gritty performance by D'Onofrio, and the actor tells us it's something he went to great lengths to create on set.

"There's that scene where she attacks you from the inside. She goes into your heart and in your mind, and in this case, she took her and I both back to just before I killed my father when he was beating my mother to death and I even have the hammer in my hand and she's trying to take all of that hate and all of that want to kill him out of me," the actor reflects.

The actor says he went to a real-world experience in his past to pull his emotions from to get ready for the scene in question. Between that and getting his own room blocked out on-set to prepare in, D'Onofrio says he was able to get to the place he needed.

"I told the DP and the director, Sydney Freeman, and the first AD that I'm going to go really, really deep here. It's going to be dark and wild, and I don't really know it's going to happen other than it's going to hurt me. It's going to be crazy," he adds. "I'm going to just go off-set. When you're ready, just call me in, I'm going to sit down and I'm going to start, and you just say, action for the crew, but I'm going to start as soon as I sit, start digging in. Yeah, so it got to this place where I felt almost straight-jacketed in a way as if she had grabbed me and held me and forced herself on me to get what she wanted, she wanted to pull this stuff out of me."

The constriction, D'Onofrio says, "was really quite something to play," and help molded the story he wanted to Kingpin to tell.

"When you can get to a place like that that's real emotionally, then you can sell any story thing you want. You can sell it that I'm in back when I'm a child and I'm about to go kill my dad. If the emotion is there and the story is grounded enough and if the script is good enough to inspire the actor to go to a place like that, then you can sell any story point you want," D'Onofrio concludes.

Starring Alaqua Cox, all five episodes of Echo debuted exclusively on both Disney+ and Hulu on Tuesday, January 9th. The origin story of Echo revisits Maya Lopez, whose ruthless behavior in New York City catches up with her in her hometown. She must face her past, reconnect with her Native American roots and embrace the meaning of family and community if she ever hopes to move forward. Vincent D'Onofrio will reprise his role as Wilson Fisk / Kingpin, and Charlie Cox will reprise his role as Matt Murdock / Daredevil. Echo will also star Chaske Spencer, Tantoo Cardinal, Devery Jacobs, Cody Lightning, Graham Greene and Zahn McClarnon.

Kevin Feige, Louis D'Esposito, Victoria Alonso, Brad Winderbaum, Stephen Broussard, Richie Palmer, Marion Dayre, and Jason Gavin (Blackfeet) are executive producers of Echo. Amy Rardin, Sydney Freeland, Christina King (Seminole), and Jennifer Booth are co-executive producers.