EXCLUSIVE: It has been 30 years since Captain America: Brave New World director Julius Onah relocated from Nigeria to America, but he still remembers his first theatrical experience like it was yesterday. It was Harrison Ford in his iconic role as Jack Ryan in Clear and Present Danger, and Onah in particular hung onto the White House scene when Ford’s character refused to give a pass to a president whose blind desire for revenge backfired horribly.
Onah not only directed Ford playing the U.S. President in Captain America: Brave New World, he also provided the template for the iconic star to transform into a red Hulk.
“I’m still pinching myself,” Onah tells Deadline about Brave New World, which hits theaters globally today.
Mentored by Spike Lee as he matriculated at NYU, Onah relaunched Marvel‘s Captain America franchise, this with Anthony Mackie stepping in for Chris Evans to hold the shield.
Given the staging of massive Marvel action set pieces, and the more intimate character moments, you might not realize Onah only has two studio films under his belt. Here he tells Deadline how his storytelling was influences by the political espionage thrillers of the 1970s, his collaborative process with Mackie, and a “pinch me” moment he had with Ford.
DEADLINE: It’s over six years since I met you when you launched Luce at Sundance. What’s it like, spending so long with the characters to craft a big Marvel superhero franchise?
ONAH: I’m incredibly grateful to be a part of this world. Between Luce premiering in 2019 and this movie, there was a little pandemic in between. I relocated, I live in Berlin now, so there was a lot of life things that changed for me. I was really excited by this opportunity because there were thematic ideas, tones, textures, genre components that are at the core of how I like to work as a filmmaker. In particular, thrillers that have elements of paranoia. Stories about complicated relationships where sometimes it’s not as easy as good and evil, black and white. This Captain America story felt, in many ways, like a continuation of some of the themes and ideas I explored in Luce. It’s important for me to have that through-line of continuity as a director and as a writer. Yet at the same time this is a world with a fly Captain America with vibranium wings, and a gigantic Red Hulk. It has been a lot of fun to play too with things that are different from what came before. I’m super excited, super pumped, and you know there is no part of me that ever got sick of it at all.
DEADLINE: You directed Luce and The Cloverfield Paradox, and then suddenly you are playing in the Marvel sandbox. Ever a point in this experience where you wished you had a few more films under your belt?
ONAH: What’s so exciting about making a movie is that it’s about the life in front of the camera. When you have a cast as talented as Anthony Mackie and Harrison Ford, you are working with some of the best performers on the planet. There was never a moment making this movie when I was like, oh, wow I don’t feel ready to be here. It has been a lifetime of wanting to do something like this. Also, coming from the theater and working with actors, it’s something that is one of my favorite parts of this. I had some twists and turns in my career, whether it was almost making, you know, a larger studio movie where I was dealing with pre-vis and stunts and action in the preparation to it, and then the experience I’ve had on God Particle / Cloverfield. From a storytelling, acting and performance standpoint, and from a technical standpoint, I felt really excited and prepared to tackle something like this. I’m eager to continue to find ways to combine performance and technology to tell stories.
DEADLINE: Filmmakers who work at Marvel have told me it’s like a second form of film school, with Nate Moore and Kevin Feige the professors…
ONAH: You’re 100 percent right. There’s such a great team of people here who work at Marvel, and then the incredible people who come in to work on these projects. Companies like Weta, stunt coordinators and fight coordinators. It was an incredible learning opportunity, a great chance to lean on these amazing people who welcomed my point of view in terms of how I wanted to tell the story both from a genre standpoint, how I wanted to use the camera very specifically, how I wanted things to work from a music and visual effects standpoint. I’m really grateful to all of them and certainly, especially to Nate Moore and Kevin Feige, they were such great partners on this.
DEADLINE: Luce didn’t have the million dollar effects or huge set pieces, but in a way I do feel like during that shoot you had probably tougher days given the serious subject matter. How did that help you here?
ONAH: The cast on Luce was phenomenal. The incredible Naomi Watts and Octavia Spencer going toe-to-toe; the incredible Tim Roth and Kelvin Harrison Jr. There is a sequence in that movie where Octavia’s sister breaks into a school and strips nude. That was one of the hardest shooting days of my career. And we did the whole thing [in a single shot], so you couldn’t cut away at any point from Octavia in that and the whole cast. It was a challenging moment to shoot, but I’m so satisfied and gratified by the way it turned out. You take an experience like that, and then you think about a movie like this, where there’s also going to be a ton of moving pieces and high degree of difficulty. That absolutely prepared me for making something like this. The other thing I took away was the rehearsal process. Luckily, Marvel was supportive of that and the entire cast, I’m still pinching myself, that you know Harrison Ford and Anthony Mackie and Danny Ramirez and everybody came early. We spent about a week and a half to two weeks workshopping scenes, trying to figure out the right shape and emotional trajectory. There was a scene that we ended up reverting to a previous version of it because after I rehearsed it, it just didn’t quite feel right. And we ended up shooting an earlier version of it that I had written, that ended up being perfect for the movie. That rehearsal process became a great way for the actors to trust each other, to trust me, and then for us to enhance dramatically what was happening in the movie. And those were all things that, from my experience on Luce, that I was able to carryover to this because the folks at Marvel were a big fan of that movie and it was a big part of the reason I ended up on Cap.
DEADLINE: Malcolm Spellman was involved with the TV show The Falcon And Winter Soldier and Anthony has been in Sam’s shoes for over a decade now. What’s it like for a writer/director to drop in when bonds and mythology are already there?
ONAH: The process was very organic. You have to earn trust when something like this starts, so in the beginning of the process there’s conversations with Malcolm, there’s conversations with Anthony, conversations with the entire team and Marvel as well too. But the reason I was brought on to the movie was because of my point of view, so I wasn’t shy about saying, here’s what I think would help sharpen the story, here’s what I think would help sharpen the genre component and the character component. And then organically from there, when that trust is developed, I eventually came onboard to also write and shape certain scenes and moments and overall arc for the film, certainly a thematic center for the film. I was very excited about the notion of empathy when you have a Captain America who doesn’t have a conventional set of superpowers, where his empathy is what he utilizes as part of his skill set to overcome adversaries and challenges. That becomes a great way to place him in a paranoid thriller, which is a genre that’s about mistrust of institutions and individuals. So, the genre component of the story that also creates a challenge for the character and becomes part of the character’s emotional journey and also that thematic journey. And what was so great is, even though Anthony has so much history with this character, he was so open to my point of view and he trusted me and I trusted him. So, we were able to take everything that he was bringing, everything that Malcolm was bringing and my point of view and just keep on working at it to create what feels like a really fun, propulsive, but character-driven thriller.
DEADLINE: How old were you when you first saw Indiana Jones?
ONAH: Wow, I first saw Indiana Jones, I think, in 1989. I was 6-years-old. And the first one I saw was the third movie. So, the Last Crusade.
DEADLINE: What would the 6-year old have thought about you working with him and turning him from president to the Red Hulk?
ONAH: I’m still pinching myself, Justin. So, I first saw him, you know, at 6 but then there was another seminal moment. I moved to America when I was 10-years-old, this was in 1993, and then in 1994 I went to a movie theater, for real, to a movie theater for the second time in my life ever. And I saw Clear and Present Danger. So, here I am now on a Zoom with Harrison Ford and Kevin Feige and Nate Moore and. Kyana Davidson and Lou D’Esposito our great team on the movie. And we are showing Harrison a rendering that the visual development department at Marvel, led by Ryan Meinerding, had made of Harrison as Red Hulk and you should see the look on his face. He’s just smiling and giddy, and we’re smiling and giddy, and when you have that sort of excitement, even on a Zoom, you know there’s something special there. And then from there I went to Harrison’s house. That was the next pinch me, pinch me moment and I’m sitting there one-on-one with him and we’re talking about this character. We’re having a drink and you can see how his mind works. He’s so preparation-oriented. He had his script out and he had notes. And it was just, it was really, really incredible because we talked through the entire emotional arc of the character, and we talked through all the details, all the things that you know would make this something worthy of him, and he did an incredible job in this film.
DEADLINE: What was that mano a mano day like?
ONAH: You know, these guys are such professionals and they have so much fun, but I think sometimes you see a scene that’s very dramatic and intense, and you think behind the scenes it’s about it being dramatic and intense, and actually it’s about having fun. You know in the biggest sort of faceoff scene between Harrison and Anthony we were cracking jokes backstage and everybody was just having such a good time. And then when they get into the scene a switch flips and they’re on and it’s like two boxers in a ring.It was so much fun to watch them work. It was a scene we had rehearsed as well too, so because there was a foundation prior to even being onset to shoot, in terms of what we wanted to accomplish in that scene, it was very helpful. And then, you know, everybody lets their guard down, has as much fun as possible, and you see it all there up onscreen. So, it was actually a really, really fun day.
DEADLINE: What subject matter and stories are you most interested in exploring next?
ONAH: I love movies, and I love genre and hopping in and out of genres, you know? So there’s the Basquiat project that I’ve been developing for many years with Kelvin Harrison Jr. that is very near and dear to my heart. I’m based in Berlin and I’m looking for stories there too. There is some really cool stuff in terms of heist, a heist project that I’ve been putting together that is German-based, that’s set in the financial world, that I’m really, really excited about. There’s a horror movie that I’ve been developing for quite some time. I love horror. It’s a genre that, you know, gives me so much pleasure both from a technical standpoint, but then also just the visceral nature of it. But this might sound really funny, there’s two genres that I really, really want to play in, I want to make a romantic comedy. And I’d love to make a musical. I grew up watching a lot of musicals, you know, going back to you know Robert Wise and movies like Sound of Music with my mom and my sisters and my brother and my whole family. So, that’s another genre I really, really would love to play and a great musical is like a great action movie, and every musical set piece is an action set piece. So, there’s a lot I would love to tackle next.
DEADLINE: Kelvin showed his vocal skills in Mufasa. Another go-around down the road for the two of you?
ONAH: Justin, I will not deny that, that crossed my mind.
DEADLINE: What will you miss about this world and what, and the marvel of it all once it’s, once you’re past the point given how long you have been a part of it and that family?
ONAH: I will most miss the moments of sitting around with the team and talking about movies. What was so impressive for me is how much of a cinephile Kevin is, and Lou D’Esposito, and Nate Moore, and the entire team there. Some of my favorite memories were listening to Lou talk about working on movies like The Freshman with Marlon Brando, or you know have Kevin and we’d talk about the movies that we snuck into. You know, I was telling him about sneaking into South Park cause I wasn’t old enough to see it and he was telling me about sneaking into St. Elmo’s Fire. So, when you are working with people who are genuinely fans of cinema and moviemaking and genre, and it was genre you know that brought me into this, we started talking about great, you know, paranoid and political thrillers. They mention the Day of the Jackal, I mentioned Point Blank and movies of that sort. It’s just so much fun. Those little quiet moments of just hanging out talking about movies were a real treat and I’m going to miss that with this group of people.