It’s a well-known fact that Marvel Studios keep a staff of well-trained snipers on hand to ‘take care’ of anyone silly enough to leak the company’s secrets. OK, that might not be a fact, it may actually be a complete fabrication on the part of a tired journalist, but the truth is if you’re part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, you’re expected to keep your mouth shut.
Owen Wilson learned this the hard way when he accidentally revealed what seemed like a harmless piece of trivia. “I let it slip I had a moustache for Mobius,” he told Esquire. “I got an ominous text saying ‘Strike one’. I don’t know who that was. We think it might have been Kevin Feige using a burner phone, but that wasn’t confirmed.”
While we love the idea of Feige sending ominous threats to his cast using a burner phone (we could call him the ‘Smiling Assassin’), it probably wasn’t him. Whenever the topic of Marvel actors letting spoilers slip comes up, he looks pretty relaxed about it. That said, he’s been working with Tom Holland and Mark Ruffalo for years now, so his doctors have probably prescribed him something for the stress at this point.
Recently Alfred Molina inadvertently spoiled his return in Spider-Man: No Way Home, giving away a lot of the adventure movie’s secrets in the process. “When we were shooting it, we were all under orders not to talk about it because it was supposed to be some great big secret,” Molina told Variety. “But, you know, it’s all over the internet. I actually described myself as the worst kept secret in Hollywood!”
Feige didn’t call on his hired goons to sort Molina out, though. In fact, he made jokes about it. While speaking to ET Online on the Black Widow red carpet, he was what was next for Julia Louis-Dreyfus after The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and he joked: “You should ask Alfred Molina.”
Feige and the Marvel Studios team have plenty to be happy about at the moment. Their new Phase 4 film Shang-Chi opens in theatres on September 3, and early word of mouth is very positive. Let’s just hope no one spoils anything.