{"id":442410,"date":"2026-01-28T07:09:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T07:09:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/442410\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T07:09:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T07:09:08","slug":"lights-camera-action-how-yahya-abdul-mateen-ii-brought-wonder-man-to-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/442410\/","title":{"rendered":"Lights, Camera, Action: How Yahya Abdul-Mateen II Brought \u2018Wonder Man\u2019 to Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is ready to raise the curtain on Simon Williams.<\/a><\/p>\n

The 39-year-old actor stars in Wonder Man<\/a>,\u00a0the eight-episode Marvel Television series premiering January 27 on Disney+. Abdul-Mateen II is, of course, no stranger to high-pressure blockbuster projects (especially those in the Super Hero genre). But Wonder Man\u00a0presented a new challenge, requiring the actor to take on an entirely new role\u2026 as an actor.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Created by Andrew Guest and Destin Daniel Cretton (Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings<\/a>), Wonder Man\u00a0follows young actor Simon Williams (Abdul-Mateen II) as he fights to build a career in Hollywood. Along the way, he strikes up an unlikely friendship with fellow actor Trevor Slattery<\/a> (Ben Kingsley), and the two find themselves pursuing life-changing roles together \u2014\u00a0especially when Simon learns that the acclaimed director Von Kovak (Zlatko Buri\u0107) is remaking his childhood favorite film, the 1980s cult classic Wonder Man.\u00a0The resulting series is a heartfelt love letter to odd-couple friendships, chasing your dreams, and the very city of Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

Wonder Man\u00a0is an unconventional show about an unconventional hero, and it\u2019s unlike anything Marvel Television has done before. But when Marvel.com sits down with Abdul-Mateen II just a few days before the show\u2019s Hollywood premiere, he\u2019s feeling no pressure \u2014 just exhilaration at finally bringing Simon to the screen.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about time!\u201d Abdul-Mateen II says with a smile. \u201cI\u2019m excited to introduce him into the Marvel universe. He\u2019s a really quirky character. He\u2019s got a whole lot of upside and potential.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here, Abdul-Mateen II opens up about the parallels between his career and Simon\u2019s, the real-life acting advice he got from Ben Kingsley, and the scene where Wonder Man got a little too\u00a0meta.\u00a0<\/p>\n

MARVEL.COM: Take me back to the beginning when you first got involved with Wonder Man. What was it about Simon Williams that made you want to tell his story?<\/p>\n

YAHYA ABDUL-MATEEN II:\u00a0At first, it wasn\u2019t even about Simon. It was really about Destin, even before Simon. I\u2019m a fan of Destin\u2019s work: Just Mercy, Short Term 12. I like his filmmaking. It\u2019s earnest. It has a lot of heart.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I talked to Destin, and he said that he wanted to do something that was different. He was describing this character that was kind of awkward. He was passionate about acting. Simon was easily relatable. His super power, to him, was not the most exciting thing about him. He has a real passion, and that was something I can get behind.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Also, Destin said that he wanted to shoot it in a way where it sort of felt like an indie. It felt different than some of the other things that were already on the Marvel slate. So I said, \u201cYeah, I really want to be a part of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

MARVEL.COM: So much of this show is about the friendship between Simon and Trevor Slattery, played by Sir Ben Kingsley. They\u2019re very different men, but they have a lot of similarities \u2014 especially their shared love for acting. What interested you most about their relationship?<\/p>\n

YAHYA ABDUL-MATEEN II:\u00a0There\u2019s this push and pull of who\u2019s the leader. Trevor has the expertise. Simon has the passion. Simon is looking for a friend, and he\u2019s also trying to teach Trevor: \u201cLook, you have to take things more seriously. You can\u2019t always approach things with a laissez-faire attitude.\u201d Trevor is saying, \u201cSometimes you just need to calm down and be in the moment and let things happen.\u201d And Simon is like, \u201cNo, that\u2019s not my process!\u201d [Laughs]<\/p>\n

What was interesting was finding a friendship between two guys on completely different sides of their career but who somehow find themselves in the same place. They have two completely different philosophies on life, but the commonality is that they both have an appreciation for the craft of acting, and that\u2019s what the friendship revolves around. That was pretty special to create that bond.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is ready to raise the curtain on Simon Williams. The 39-year-old actor stars in Wonder…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":442411,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[64,63,134,344],"class_list":["post-442410","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/442411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}