Yahya Abdul-Mateen II wasn’t going to waste his one “Marvel buck.” This is the same man who walked away from a George Miller’s “Furiosa.”
The move was necessary. Six straight years of work — “The Get Down,” “Aquaman,” “Watchmen,” “The Trial of the Chicago 7,” “The Matrix Resurrections,” “Black Mirror” and “The Handmaid’s Tale” — had left him, by his own admission, depleted. Conversations with Miller about the “Mad Max” prequel were warm and respectful, he is careful to note, but the prospect of another nine-month overseas shoot collided with the simple desire for an apartment that was not, in his words, mostly “a storage unit.”
“It was just the place where my stuff was,” he recalls.
Dan Doperalski for Variety
Seven months after exiting “Furiosa,” the call came for “Topdog/Underdog” on Broadway and the role of Booth — one he had wanted for two decades and which led to his first Tony nomination. The stage run reignited what burnout had put on the back burner. And in the middle of that play, another call came: a new Marvel TV series called “Wonder Man,” about an actor who needed a break and who was extravagantly passionate about craft.
Asked, cheekily, if the character felt familiar, he offered a smirk and a giggle: “Just a little bit.”
The 39-year-old has long been knowledgeable about the economics of franchise participation. But he needed to make it count.
“I only get one of these Marvel bucks to spin,” he tells Variety. So he made the big move and asked to speak to the Marvel Studios president. Adjusting his position and leaning forward with excitement, he says what he told his agent after getting the script: “Get Kevin Feige on the phone!”
He laughs as he tells the story, obviously performing the moment slightly bigger than it likely played in real time, but the throughline is real. “My agents were like, ‘Um, I think Kevin is really busy,’” he remembers. But he insisted on the meeting before signing on, despite his team’s gentle protests. Eventually, the Zoom happens, and the conversation is direct.
“I told him some of the things that I wanted to do,” he recalls. “I told him, ‘One of the things I like about the character is that he’s funny. And I am funny.’ And when I said I’m funny, he pointed to me, as if to say, ‘Yes!’”
Dan Doperalski for Variety
That type of affirmation is the engine of “Wonder Man,” and the reason a performer best known for the gravity of his Emmy-winning turn in HBO’s “Watchmen,” as well as Bobby Seale in the Oscar-nominated “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and Black Manta in “Aquaman,” arrives at this pivotal moment in his career.
Series director and executive producer Destin Daniel Cretton wasn’t thinking about superpowers when he cast him; instead, he saw him on stage in New York in “Topdog/Underdog.”
“He brought a kind of insane levity to certain scenes that had the whole audience just rolling on the ground laughing,” Cretton shares. “And then, by the end of the play, I was bawling my eyes out.”
That fluency was, for the Hawaiian-Japanese director, the entire casting brief. “We needed a really good actor who could go head-to-head with Sir Ben Kingsley,” he says. “Someone who felt like the perfect kind of reflection of that character.”
“Wonder Man” gives Abdul-Mateen II, beyond the comedy, the permission to play a Black character who is allowed to be a person. He gets to be funny (because he is) and anxious — and ambitious. It clearly explains why he’s in the hunt for an Emmy nomination for lead comedy actor.
The series, on its surface, is about a struggling actor with combustible ionic powers he cannot fully control. But Abdul-Mateen II reframes that premise. “Simon doesn’t trust whether or not he’s actually as gifted as he thinks he is,” he says. “The ability spilling out is a manifestation of his own doubt about himself. And everybody relates to that.”
Cretton reads the show similarly. “I never looked at this as a satire,” he says. “I looked at this as a realistic portrayal of our collective experience trying to get into this industry, having big dreams and then getting hit in the face with the reality of how harsh it can be at times, how absurd it can be at times, and how, sometimes, your dream can be kind of twisted and corrupted.”
The on-set partnership with Kingsley, who plays the gloriously ham-handed Trevor Slattery, became its own master class. Abdul-Mateen II had a working relationship with the British veteran, built on minimal pre-take chatter and maximum trust, citing a piece of advice from the elder actor that has become something of a personal mantra. “The only time we have on set as actors is the moment between action and cut,” he says, paraphrasing Kingsley. “Everything else is for everyone else.” For two thespians playing characters whose friendship deepens across the season, the discipline served the storytelling. “We didn’t talk much in between takes. It allowed the audience to actually truly witness us meeting each other for the first time.”
Yahya Abdul-Mateen II with Ben Kingsley in “Wonder Man”
Suzanne Tenner/Marvel
All of his success is reflected through the prism of how the New Orleans-born, Oakland-raised, youngest of seven would describe his current place in Hollywood. Abdul-Mateen II is unsentimental and says his younger self “wouldn’t be impressed” at where he is today.
“He’d say, ‘That’s it?’”
That constant hunger is also what is now empowering his next chapter. Netflix’s “Man on Fire,” in which he plays John Creasy in a more grounded register than the Tony Scott film, was an exercise in finding “the truth in the situation of loss and addiction, loss in alcoholism and grief.”
Across all of it, what is emerging is not just an actor but an ambitious producer. Abdul-Mateen II’s production company, House Eleven10, named after his childhood home in Oakland, focuses on uplifting talent from underrepresented communities. The company launched alongside a creative partnership with Netflix, including Abdul-Mateen II starring in and producing films for the streamer. He is now developing the original feature “Bio” with “Man on Fire” director Stephen Caple Jr.
“It is my goal and a part of my mission statement to push more Black and diverse stories with more Black and diverse leads at a quality level that matches what I’ve been able to do in my career thus far,” he declares. “Every time I’m on set, I’m looking at how things are being done. I’m trying to understand where the money is coming from.”
That lens informs how he reads the world beyond the studio. Abdul-Mateen II was raised by his Muslim father and Christian mother; the unity inside his own home is the prism through which he reads the moment that has seeped into the political square.
“We had unity,” he states. “Why can’t they?”
It’s no secret that religion is being weaponized in the current political climate, where there is a constant framing of Muslims as villains in American discourse. He’s careful to redirect the question to the people doing the framing rather than the faiths being framed.
“These are not religious problems. These are human problems,” he says. “We’re dealing with greed. We’re dealing with human qualities. What I was taught about Islam and what I learn when I turn to my Bible, I’m learning about peace. I’m learning about love. I’m learning about minding your own business.”
The trick, in his view, is the framing itself.
“The truth of what’s going on is we have human beings and people in power fighting for more power, using religion as a guise,” he continues. “If they’re being led by the desire to conquer and feed off power, which is against the spirit of generosity, love and peace, they can’t be led by the God that I have a relationship with. It’s impossible. They’re being led by something completely different.”
For “Wonder Man” itself, Marvel handed Cretton a Season 2 order in March. The writers’ room is already at work. Cretton declines to map specifics but is firm on tone: “We love these characters. We’re not planning to suddenly turn this into a completely different show.”
It is also worth noting how Abdul-Mateen II watched the first season, for the first time in his career, with company. He typically waits three years before revisiting his own work. With “Wonder Man,” he sat down with the YouTube reaction community.
“They got it. They’re living their dreams. Many of them have changed careers to keep the dream alive,” he says. “And they were watching this show, about this guy, trying to hold on to his.”
Regarding what he wants for Simon next, he sounds like a fan first and a leading man second. “Simon’s a star,” he says. “I want to put Simon in ‘Independence Day.’ That’s what I’m excited to do.”
He is, in his own way, also describing himself.
