1 MCU Actor Reveals They Were Almost Cast As Black Widow’s Taskmaster

One of the Black Widow actors is opening up about how they were initially almost cast to play Taskmaster in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

In a new interview with The Direct, O-T Fagbenle – who ultimately played Rick Mason in Black Widow – explained that he had initially auditioned for the role of Taskmaster, and that there were previous plans for a different version of the Marvel antagonist. Fagbenle also shared whether he would still love to bring that version of Taskmaster to life in the MCU down the line, as he stated the following:

Basically, I first auditioned for Taskmaster, and it was this, it was a really incredible speech, actually. It was an audition I was very proud of. I’ve still got it in the back someplace. And, he was this — I made him with an African accent, and he was this kind of maniacal-like character.

And somewhere along the journey of writing and things above my pay grade — So, I basically got [told] that [the role] was down to like, ‘Is it me or is it someone else.’ That kind of thing for that version of Taskmaster. And in the various iterations of the movie, that version of Taskmaster went away, and then they just came to me and was like, ‘Hey, there is this character called Mason, do you want to play Mason?’… So I was like, ‘Hell yeah,’ I’d love to play Mason!’ And so, the Taskmaster that I was going to be didn’t exist in that iteration of ‘Black Widow.’

Oh man, I tell you… The character I created for that was something I’ve not done before, or something people have not seen me do before. I was being really hyped. But anyway, there’ll be another opportunity for me to pull that maniac out of the bag and put it on screen.

Listen, this what I said to Eric [Pearson], I said, ‘Why are you leaving me out of ‘Thunderbolts,’ man? I did come back. I did some ‘Secret Invasion,’ Mason appeared there. And so, yeah, I mean, like a true superhero, when they give me the call [I’m ready to go].

Source: The Direct