The president of Marvel Studios refuses to undo the death of Tony Stark a.k.a. Iron Man in 'Avengers: Endgame' and bring back the beloved character for future films.
- Dec 4, 2023
AceShowbiz - Robert Downey Jr. will not be returning as Iron Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe despite recent reports giving hope of a possible resurrection. Kevin Feige has ruled out bringing back the actor and his beloved character for future Marvel films.
In a new interview with Vanity Fair about the Academy Award nominee, Feige is pretty adamant about not undoing Tony Stark a.k.a. Iron Man's death in "Avengers: Endgame". "We are going to keep that moment and not touch that moment again," he says. "We all worked very hard for many years to get to that, and we would never want to magically undo it in any way."
In the same interview, the president of Marvel Studios recalls that executives at Marvel Entertainment almost turned down RDJ to play Iron Man against his and "Iron Man" director Jon Favreau's wish. "It purely came down to the Marvel board being nervous at putting all of their chips in their future films on somebody who famously had those legal troubles in the past," he explains.
Of how he was able to convince the higher-ups to cast the actor in the role, Feige shares, "I wasn't very good-and I'm still not great-at taking no for an answer. But I also don't pound my chest to try to get my way. I try to figure out ways to make it as clear to other people why we should head in a direction. And that's when the idea of a screen test came up."
Feige also talks about RDJ being a mentor to his MCU co-stars. "We used to joke and say that Robert was the head of the acting department because everybody there looked up to him," he dishes. "He took them all under his wing, but not in a subservient sense. He just became their cheerleader."
RDJ's wife Susan Downey can attest to her husband's strong sense of nurturing towards his co-stars as she shares, "I even saw it at Chris Evans's wedding [to Alba Baptista]. Chris Evans and Chris Hemsworth were talking to Robert. I was like, 'Oh right, he is the guy who is...' I don't want to say a mentor, but I just see him as the dude who knows a lot."
"He's been through a lot of scenarios, both in life and in work, and has survived a lot," Susan adds. She says she was drawn to him for the same reason, gushing, "All of the stuff that made him wonderful and weird when I met him, and made him someone unlike anyone I've ever known, is still who he is today."
Back in November, Variety reported that Marvel had had talks about bringing back the original cast of "The Avengers" for the next sequel, including reviving Iron Man and Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow. While the site said "the studio hasn't yet committed to the idea" as it was noted that bringing back those actors wouldn't be cheap, movie scooper MyTimeToShineHello tweeted a few days later that "RDJ already agreed to come back."
The same account posted that Evans has also agreed to reprise his role as Captain America, with claim about a specific project which he will allegedly star in. "Sources confirmed that Chris Evans also agreed to come back for Avengers: Secret Wars," the tweet read.
