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Credit: Marvel<\/p>\n
Kumail Nanjiani already had a sizable collection of film credits by the time Eternals came along, but bulking up was new territory for him on the Marvel movie. The actor put on a lot of muscle to play Kingo<\/a> in the MCU\u2019s 26th theatrical installment. It\u2019s been a little over four years since Eternals\u2019 release, and while his Kingo remains uncertain, Nanjiani has joked about maintaining his impressive physique no matter what.<\/p>\n In addition to starring opposite Emma Mackey and Jamie Lee Curtis in Ella McCay, last month also saw Kumail Nanjiani: Night Thoughts<\/a>, the comedian\u2019s latest stand-up special<\/a>, becoming available to stream with a Hulu subscription<\/a>. In it, he brought up how some of his detractors online decided Nanjiani would be the first person they \u201cmock for getting in shape.\u201d After saying noting how hard it was to achieve his current physique and joking that he hasn\u2019t \u201csmelled cake in years,\u201d Nanjiani declared:<\/p>\n And now I know all of you are waiting for me to go back to how I was. Oh, it\u2019ll make you so happy if I go back to how I was. So, now I\u2019m stuck in this prison, \u2019cause I don\u2019t want to give you the satisfaction.<\/p>\n Related Stories<\/p>\n Kumail Nanjiani as Kingo in Eternals<\/p>\n This joke came out of Kumail Nanjiani addressing the five kinds of negative responses he got online when he talked about going to therapy<\/a>, the first of which was, \u201cOh, your big Hollywood movie didn\u2019t do well? Are we supposed to feel sorry for you?\u201d This refers to how Eternals was met with mixed critical reception and only made a little over $402 million worldwide off a reported $236.2 million budget. Although it ended up being the sixth-highest-grossing movie of 2021, that performance wasn\u2019t enough to make it profitable, and Nanjiani countered that while others don\u2019t have to feel sorry him, he\u2019s allowed to feel sorry for himself.<\/p>\n Going back to his physique, Kumail Nanjiani continued to joke about how he\u2019s going to keep that muscle packed on regardless of whether or not we see him as Kingo again, even if it means giving up cake for good. In his words:<\/p>\n There\u2019s no reason for me to be buff anymore, but I am because fuck you. I\u2019ll be doing pushups on my deathbed because fuck you. When I look at cake and want to eat it, I think of how happy it\u2019ll make you if I eat it and that gives me the strength to not eat it.<\/p>\n The funny thing is that Kumail Nanjiani didn\u2019t bulk up for Eternals because it was a requirement<\/a> from Marvel Studios, but because he \u201cneeded to change how people saw me so I could have the type of opportunities I was excited about.\u201d So regardless of what the future holds in store for him MCU-wise, maintaining his current physique could help him score more outside-of-the-box roles. Jokes aside, I hope he does indulge in cake again. That kind of deliciousness shouldn\u2019t be avoided for the rest of his life.<\/p>\n Nanjiani signed on to do six Marvel movies<\/a>, a video game and a theme park ride. However, following Eternals\u2019 underwhelming performance, there are still no plans for a sequel, and the closest we\u2019ve come to those events being acknowledged is Celestial Island being a key plot point in Captain America: Brave New World<\/a>. Nanjiani also voiced an alternate version of Kingo in the What If\u2026 ? episode “What If… Agatha Went to Hollywood?\u201d, which can be streamed with a Disney+ subscription<\/a>, but I\u2019ll keep my fingers crossed that Marvel finds a way to bring the character back into the fold on the big screen someday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Credit:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215311,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[430,156,100500,25946,130157,117208,130158,2529,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-215310","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-celebrities","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-eternals","11":"tag-jamie-lee-curtis","12":"tag-kingo","13":"tag-kumail-nanjiani","14":"tag-marvel-movie","15":"tag-marvel-studios","16":"tag-new-zealand","17":"tag-newzealand","18":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215310\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Kumail](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/61c246f0c67c8947eea68c9d465bde0b.jpeg\"\/)
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