Marvel Studios
The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s difficult current state is partly due to its overexpansion across too many streaming shows of varying quality – but at the same time, the best of these series have introduced some of the current MCU’s most promising characters. The bright spot in the just-released film “The Marvels” are the new teammates who join Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers: Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) from “Ms. Marvel” from Disney+ and Monica Rambeau, first played by Teyonah Parris in the best MCU series. WandaVision. (The character, who has had various superhero names in the comics including Pulsar and, yes, Captain Marvel, first appeared in the MCU as a child in 2019’s “Captain Marvel,” played by Akira Akbar.)
In an interview originally conducted for Rolling Stone’s WandaVision oral history, the Juilliard-educated Parris — who also starred in “Candyman” and “They Cloned Tyrone” and broke out with Dawn Chambers in “Mad Men” — looked back at it , what it was like joining the MCU and more.
You said you first became aware of the character of Monica Rambeau through tweets from fans who wanted to see her in the role, which was such a unique way to get introduced.
Yes, that was five or six years ago. I was repeatedly asked about it on Twitter. And if you see it enough times, you wonder, “Well, who is that?” And so it was Monica Rambeau. And I looked for her. And I thought, “Wow, she’s great and has a really rich history in the comics.” But to be honest, she’s a woman and she’s a black woman. So I think the likelihood that we would see them at this point was very slim. And that was it. I said, “Oh, thanks, guys. How sweet. And we will now move on to more realistic, achievable dreams.”
Then when she showed up as a young girl in Captain Marvel, I thought, “Oh my God, wow. This is the character that fans have been talking about.” And the strange and crazy thing is that when I watched the Captain Marvel movie, I never thought that she would actually grow up and maybe they would have to cast her as an adult. I never realized it. That really wasn’t the case. So I liked the movie and just left it. But essentially it came back and I auditioned for it. And then I found out I was Monica Rambeau. And that was a very surreal feeling.
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Because you knew the whole story and what it meant to be cast as her and that it was much more than just a role in WandaVision?
It was surreal because I always wanted to be in the MCU. And I practically didn’t see how that would happen. So it was like, “Oh my God, I’m a part of the MCU.” I didn’t know what character I was going to play. And then I found out it was Monica Rambeau, who’s an absolute badass with a long history and a very beloved character in the comics, and I was like, “Oh, damn, I get to play her.” Added to that was that Fans wanted exactly this character from me.
And what made the whole thing so surreal was that at that point I didn’t know what they were going to do with Monica in WandaVision because I didn’t have any scripts. I mean, they had barely told me the name of the show at that point when they told me I got the part. Maybe two months after I got the job, I saw the storyboards on the wall and saw my face [digitally pre-visualized] in pictures of the action stuff – the moment when Monica goes through the curse, they had the storyboard with my face. And it was just so overwhelming that I remember bursting into tears in the room in front of them. They got me tissues and I’m walking around the hallway and all of a sudden I see Kevin Feige and he’s like, “What are you doing out here?” and I’m trying to calm myself down.
What thoughts led to these tears?
I thought about my parents, their love, their encouragement, the bad times when you might not book anything for a year and a half and have no money. I just felt the support and love and how many people led me to this moment. That was a real dream, being a Marvel superhero, and I’m here. I think it was also knowing that it’s not often that we’re a woman and a black woman in this superhero space. Now I can contribute to that narrative, to that representation, and be part of the images that I wanted to see more of as a young girl. So there was a lot.
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I thought about my parents, their love, their encouragement, the bad times when you might not book anything for a year and a half and have no money… That was a real dream, being a Marvel superhero and I’m here.
It’s a difficult thing to embody a character we last saw as a child, and you’re obviously a different actress. And there was something about it that felt so seamless. From the first second I saw you, I firmly believed it was the same person. When examining Akira Akbar’s performance in Captain Marvel, was there anything in particular that made it work so well?
I find [casting director] Sarah Finn just did a great job of recognizing the similarities between Akira Akbar and I, you know, the things that we have in common. I watched Akira in Captain Marvel and realized how smart she is, how she stands up for herself, and how intuitive she was even as a small child. And so I tried to bring some of those big, broad characteristics into the person that Monica is today. There is a long time between our first meeting and my appearance. As humans, we change with our experiences. Although she may have been an open, free child, I had to find out what happened to Monica between that time and how it might have shaped her today – her experiences with Carol Danvers, her experiences with her mother and now she lost her mother , wasn’t even there for that and had to process that grief. So we actually got to a lot of moments that would actually shape someone’s personality. So I just used things like that.
For anyone who grew up reading comics in the ’80s, Captain Marvel was Monica Rambeau. You know, that was the first Captain Marvel I met.
Fans who have loved her for years or decades come up to me and let me know how special she is to them and what she meant to them as a child. And it’s pretty cool that it’s been present in people’s lives for so long. And the character is really loved by many. And that’s great.
Have you thought about how to balance the MCU with the rest of your career?
I think I’ll just play it as it comes. I’m just going to approach it with an open heart, gratitude, and grace, and we’ll see what happens.
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After all, is Juilliard training still useful if you’re 50 feet in the air wearing a harness?
[Laughs] Oh man, Matt Shakman had a little running joke with me like, “Oh, did they teach you that at Juilliard?” Like when there was a green screen behind me and I was trying to act so nothing was there. They didn’t teach me that at Juilliard. But there were other things and elements that were taught as well, which was to stand on the ground and just be in the here and now, and that’s exactly what I’m trying to do.