Chris Evans Says Captain America Is "A Great Character to Play"
Posted 04.05.10 by BrentJS
Only a few weeks before the official casting announcement was made, Chris Evans' name was not even on the list of actors assumed to be in contention for the lead role in director Joe Johnston's The First Avenger: Captain America, Marvel Studios' adaptation of its popular patriotic comic book superhero. That just goes to show how tightly wrapped in secrecy Marvel Studios is keeping its closely-connected superhero movies leading up to the super-team movie The Avengers in 2012. Now, for the first time, Evans has publicly commented on landing the role that puts him in the distinguished company of his fellow Avengers, two-time Oscar-nominated actors Edward Norton (Bruce Banner in The Incredible Hulk) and Robert Downey Jr. (Tony Stark in Iron Man 2), and newcomer Chris Hemsworth (title character in Thor).
While attending the WonderCon comic book convention in San Francisco this past weekend, Evans managed to dodge more than one interviewer's questions about Captain America. Attending to support his other comic book movies, The Losers and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Evans told HitFix that he tries to "stay away from" the casting rumors and that it was "almost none of [his] business." He also refused to speculate on whether he would be dying his hair blonde to match Steve Rogers' look in the comic books, something he didn't do to portray the Marvel superhero Johnny Storm, aka The Human Torch, in two Fantastic Four movies. Evans again dodged questions about the role when he spoke with Collider, this time saved by the timely intervention of his The Losers co-star, Columbus Short, ultimately laughing off the topic by saying, "They were gonna go black."
However, during a press conference for The Losers, Evans finally opened up a bit about Captain America. He admitted that he doesn't have "a history or love of" reading comic books, but that the strength of the character is what drew him to the role.
I think Marvel is doing a lot of good things right now. [Captain America is] a fun character, even if it wasn't a comic book. I think the story of Steve Rogers is great. He's a great guy. Even if it was just a script about anybody, I'd probably want to do it.
He's a great character to play. He just happens to be a comic book hero, too, and that's where I'm coming from.
Evans said that, because movies are a collaborative medium, it's often hard to predict what the end result is going to be while making a movie. He said that the benefit of making a movie based on a comic book is that you at least have a starting point for the tone and visuals of the movie.
You have all of these different creative people come together trying to make something. The director is the quarterback trying to bridge the gap of all these different artists together with words. A lot of the times, the message can be lost in translation.
The beautiful thing about comic books or even movies based on novels, you have a blueprint, you have something tangible thing where you can go, 'This is the world we're going for.' Especially in comic books you have a color palette, you have a visual home base to root yourself in. As an actor, it's nice knowing at least the people behind the visual element to the film have this nice blueprint to work off. As an actor, you have something to go off of too. It's a treat! It's always nice working on a comic book (movie) because you know what you're getting into beforehand.
Johnston is currently scouting locations for The First Avenger: Captain America in Europe, with the movie slated to begin production in June. The only other actor cast in the movie at this time is Sebastian Stan in the role of James "Bucky" Barnes, Captain America's WWII sidekick and confidante.
Next Showing: The First Avenger: Captain America opens July 22, 2011