On Friday, Marvel Studios embarks on its biggest bet since the premiere of “The Avengers” in 2012 with the premiere of its first TV series for Disney Plus, “WandaVision”. While other Marvel divisions have ventured into series that are nominally part of the Marvel cinematic universe – like ABC’s “Agents of SHIELD” and Netflix’s “Daredevil” and “Jessica Jones” – “WandaVision” is the first television adventure produced by Marvel Studios itself, that is, by studio boss Kevin Feige.
Over 12 years, Feige led the 23 feature films at the MCU to a historic and transformative industry success, as each film brought together a large tapestry of narrative that culminated in “Avengers: Endgame” and “Spider-Man” : Away from Home ”of 2019.” The next phase of the MCU – the “Black Widow” and “Eternals” films and the Disney Plus series “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” and “WandaVision” – should open in 2020. The pandemic COVID-19, however, pushed all of those titles into 2021 and forced the studio to scramble its programming and put “WandaVision” on pole position for the MCU’s future.
That decision was, at least in part, logistical: “WandaVision”, starring Elizabeth Olsen as Wanda Maximoff (also known as Scarlet Witch) and Paul Bettany as Vision, places her characters within versions of classic American sitcoms like “The Dick Van Dyke Show “,” Bewitched, “and” The Brady Bunch “, allowing for a more friendly production footprint for TV that helped the show finish first. But it’s also symbolic.” WandaVision “- by showrunner Jac Schaeffer and director Matt Shakman – it’s radically different from everything Feige and Marvel Studios have done before, and makes it very clear that the MCU’s foray into TV will not be a normal business.
Feige himself is busier than ever, with at least 17 feature films and TV titles scheduled for the next two years – not to mention his side acting in the production of a film “Star Wars” alongside projects by feature “Star Wars” by his fellow superhero storyteller Patty Jenkins (“Wonder Woman 1984”) and Taika Waititi (“Thor: Love and Thunder”). Feige isn’t exactly eager to talk about venturing into a galaxy far, far away. But in your conversation with Variety about Zoom, the 47-year-old super producer was sincere about how much of himself he dedicated to “WandaVision” and how the pandemic is already reshaping his plan for the MCU.
What inspired you to tell this particular story with Wanda and Vision through classic sitcoms?
The answer to the show is because Wanda and Vision are great characters in the comics that we don’t scratch in the movies, played by actors who are so spectacular, and we just scratch the surface of what they can do. Putting the spotlight on the actors who play these characters was the main reason for wanting to do “WandaVision”. The way we did it is largely because, as a child, I spent an excessive amount of time watching TV and repeating several sitcom series. I’m old enough to remember when Nick at Nite was a new thing.
I really got attached psychologically to a lot of these fake TV characters. It was the only aspect of my youth and what made me the person I am today [that] we were never able to really use it. My love for all kinds of films and genre films was absolutely poured into all 23 films that you have seen us make at Marvel Studios, but that aspect of my past, I had not even considered necessarily being able to do anything.
The two things that changed was seeing the [2016] comic mini-series “The Vision” [by writer Tom King and artists Gabriel Hernandez Walta and Mike Del Mundo] end up on my desk. These particular covers of Visão on the door of a suburban house with a white fence and a mailbox that says “The Visions” – which is almost a “Leave it to Beaver” image – and what it was like when he was in that environment is the that led me to say: “Let’s see how to put these two things together”. AND [second], doing what is now our first Disney Plus series in a way that couldn’t be just a movie. It’s not just a long movie at Disney Plus. We will do programs like this, but for our first one, it was great to do something that could only be done for television.
You have 10 titles set for this year and at least seven titles announced for 2022, which is a considerable expansion of Marvel studios in previous years. What are you doing to maintain the quality control for which Marvel is so well known?
The time spent doing these things was almost the same. We only had a year delay, like everyone else, before we could launch them. Certainly, a series of films that were to be released this year should have been released last year. But even with that in mind, yes, there is certainly much more to it than we did before. And it’s really everything we’ve been building on for the past three years. As we were ending the Infinity Saga with “Endgame”, “Infinity War” and “Far From Home”, we were also planning what was to come next. And this expansion to Disney Plus was part of that from the beginning. It was the notion of growing and expanding the MCU for this different platform, that would allow us to explore more characters – like Wanda and Vision, like Loki, like Falcon and the Winter Soldier – that we know before, but we don’t know, we are able to concentrate or to spend as much time as we want. And also continue to bring new characters to the MCU, thanks to the embarrassment of the richness of the comics. We have an incredible team in the studios with creative producers dedicated to each project, 24 hours a day on site. The management system that we started when there were only a few films and a handful of us, is the same now when it comes to many films, and much, much more about us.
TV metabolism is usually that a new season of a show arrives approximately once a year or so. Is that what you’re looking for in Marvel’s Disney Plus shows?
This will vary. There are some programs that were built to further expand our narrative and then go into resources. We have already announced the participation of Lizzie Olsen in “Doctor Strange 2.” We announced Teyonah Parris as part of “Captain Marvel 2.” There are some programs that, although always interconnected, are being built with several seasons in mind. So, it will vary a lot in the way I think a good TV varies now, be it a few years between the seasons of “Game of Thrones” or “Stranger Things”, or an offs like – what did I just watch? – “Queen’s Gambit.” One of the fun things about streaming is that the rules are flexible, which allows you to follow creatively wherever you want.
The pandemic, which you alluded to earlier, is an experience that almost everyone on the planet has shared together, which is something that has never really happened before in our lives in this way. How will the MCU handle this creatively, moving forward?
I’ll tell you, because it’s a very good question, that about a year and a half ago, while we were developing all these things – maybe two years ago, I don’t remember – I started saying Blip, the Thanos event that radically changed everything between the “Infinity War” and the “Endgame”, which gave this universal universal galactic experience to people, would only serve us so well, that we just need to keep looking ahead and going to new places. I was afraid that it would become like the Battle of New York, which was the third act of “Avengers”, which ended up being referred to as an event that was constantly, and sometimes better than others. I was suspicious of that. When we started to enter a global pandemic in March and April and May, we started going, holy mackerel, the Blip, this universal experience – just as you described – this experience that has affected all humans on Earth, now has a direct parallel between what the people who live in the MCU have found and what we all in the real world have found. And it has been quite interesting, as you will see, in a series of our next projects, the parallels in which it will seem that people are talking about the COVID pandemic. Within the context of the MCU, they are talking about the blip.
But it really revitalized that notion in a way that made it substantive. My nervousness was just because it was an event that we constantly refer to between things. I wish there was more meaning behind it. And if that meant leaving him behind and inventing new things, that was it. Of course, we always come up with new things in comics too, but the real-world connotations are shockingly and somewhat depressing relevant now between our worlds.
We report, as well as others, that “Loki’s” showrunner Michael Waldron is going to write a “Star Wars” movie that you are producing. What is the difficult time horizon for you? Are we thinking about the beginning, the middle or the end of the 2020s?
We are thinking that we are not – that is, um – everything you heard about that was released. These are not things that we officially announce or discuss. So suffice it to say that the focus is on all of the Marvel stuff we’re working on. What, where, when and how [“Star Wars” movie], I do not know. I’m excited for “The Book of Boba Fett,” and the “Rogue One” show, and the Obi-Wan show, and Patty’s film, and Taika’s film. [Smiles] After “Thor: Love and Thunder”, of course.
This interview was edited and condensed.