Marvel welcomes Michael Douglas

Actor shares experience working on upcoming film ‘Ant-Man’

LOS ANGELES: From Fatal Attraction and Wall Street to last year’s Beyond the Reach, Michael Douglas has never shied away from characters that have mislaid their moral compasses. But as he enters what he calls “the afternoon” of his career, Douglas wanted to play the hero. In Marvel’s latest superhero movie Ant-Man, in theatres on July 17, Douglas plays scientist Hank Pym, who creates a technology that allows its user to shrink and become an insect-sized superhero. Douglas, 70, drew him to a Marvel movie and what he’d do as Ant-Man.

The actor shared what enticed him to take on a Marvel movie saying, “Wouldn’t you or wouldn’t anybody in this world want to get in one of these movies if you can? I mean, everyone says ‘this will stereotype me or typecast me.’ I don’t have to worry about that.”



“I came into the Marvel world in the afternoon of my career. So this to me was such a joy, and a treat to do something I’ve never done before, with the kind of special effects these movies have, play a good guy, a heroic guy, someone my children can look up to,” he added.

Discussing about his on-screen character Hank Pym the ‘good guy’, he said, “You know old Mikey likes complexities. I always like characters that have a little mix in the air, a little bit of darkness that goes a long way.”

On a question about how Ant-Man get to do that the other Marvel superhero movies haven’t really tapped into, he said, “Probably more of the sense of humor that the Guardians of the Galaxy had to a degree. The whole concept of getting small and looking at the special effects of the eyes of an ant, I think this is really going to blow a lot of people’s mindsets.”

Douglas also said that the movie explores parent-kid relationship that tap into today’s world and audience. He further explained the theme saying, “I would say relationships of the parent and their kid, struggling with those relationships and certainly good over evil. People always ask me, ‘if you could be Ant-Man, what is the first thing you would do?’ For me that would be eliminating nuclear weapons. That would be my first goal.”

That’s a pretty big goal for a pretty small ant. 

Published in The Express Tribune, July 13^th,  2015.

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