‘Echo’ Star Vincent D’Onofrio Talks Kingpin’s Next Move and ‘Daredevil: Born Again’ Reboot

[This story contains spoilers for Echo.]

Echo star Vincent D’Onofrio isn’t ready to say whether Wilson “Kingpin” Fisk has been healed by Maya Lopez.

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At the end of Disney+ and Hulu’s five-episode miniseries, Echo, Maya (Alaqua Cox) utilizes the powers of her Choctaw ancestors to enter Fisk’s mind and potentially heal him of his childhood trauma involving his abusive father and the ball-peen hammer he used to stop him. Once Maya releases Fisk from her grip, he desperately wants to know what she’s done to him, but he’s whisked away before the police arrive on the scene.

At this moment, D’Onofrio can’t give the game away, especially with Daredevil: Born Again still en route.

“That’s a good question, but I can’t answer that question. That question is boxed up in a lot of other stuff, and I can’t open that box,” D’Onofrio tells The Hollywood Reporter.

The mid-credit scene also shows Fisk licking his wounds on his private plane until his interest is piqued by a news report about New York City’s lack of a strong mayoral candidate. The scene ends with Fisk seemingly interested in running for mayor, and while D’Onofrio can’t divulge too much about this story point either, he doesn’t believe Maya’s powers altered Fisk in such a way that he would suddenly devote his life to public service.

“I don’t think he’s changed; I think he’s enlightened,” D’Onofrio says. “I haven’t seen a lot of the episodes of Echo. So, in my mind, after everything goes down with Maya, he gets on a plane, and … by the end of that flight, he decides, ‘If I want to be all powerful, this is what I’m going to do.’ That’s the most I can tell you.”

In September 2023, Daredevil: Born Again, starring D’Onofrio and Charlie Cox, hit the reset button and overhauled its planned 18-episode series after early footage failed to meet Marvel Studios’ expectations. The Punisher writer Dario Scardapane was brought on as the new showrunner, and it was soon decided that the isolated Marvel universe that once resided on Netflix would become MCU canon.

“During our restart of all the creative on Daredevil: Born Again, all the creatives got together and said, ‘Look, this is how we’ve got to do it now,’” D’Onofrio says. “So we are for sure only speaking about it in terms of being directly connected to the original Daredevil, and that’s a great thing. It brings in a lot of cool stories and all the collateral story that happened in those original three seasons.”

D’Onofrio is particularly excited about Born Again’s addition of Moon Knight and Loki directing duo, Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead.

“I’m a huge fan of those guys, and I talk to them all the time now,” D’Onofrio shares. “When I heard that [they were joining Born Again], I was like, ‘OK, not only are we switching things up, but the bosses are doing the right thing for us.’ They’ve given us their hottest talent, and that’s pretty cool. So the first thing I did was thank them. I thanked Kevin [Feige] for doing that and sticking with Charlie [Cox] and I. It’s a pretty amazing thing.”

Below, during a recent spoiler conversation with THR, D’Onofrio also discusses Fisk’s complicated familial relationship with Maya, before reflecting on the recent passing of his Homicide: Life on the Street co-star Andre Braugher.

Your friend Ethan Hawke told the world that he knows he’s going to get your best material when you tell someone to close the door. So are all your doors closed right now?

(Laughs.) Yeah, all the doors are closed.

When you first signed up to join the MCU, was it a package deal of Hawkeye, Echo and Daredevil: Born Again? 

Sort of. I don’t want to get into the specifics of it. They called me and said, “Hey, we want to bring you into the MCU, and we have a lot of things in mind.” It was a fantastic call to get. You quickly realize that they’re a hundred percent in with you and they want to know if you’re in with them, even if they aren’t ready to tell you about anything. So you don’t get specifics, but you get a lot of enthusiasm and an invitation to the MCU, which is a pretty cool thing.

Hawkeye gave Fisk a bit of sartorial flare, but he’s returned to his more familiar look in Echo. Was that your suggestion? Or did the Echo team already intend for that?

Sydney Freeland, who’s the executive producer and one of the directors of Echo, wanted me to do Echo. In our first conversation, she explained to me the story of Echo and that Maya Lopez’s journey was going to lead to some dark stuff and a bit of violence. So I already knew that my character works best in that Daredevil kind of tone, and when Sydney told me about the special way she wanted to tell Maya Lopez’s story, I was like, “Great. I love it because I really do think that Kingpin works best in a darker tone.”

You agreed with me previously that these former Netflix characters can be put on a new trajectory without contradicting what’s come before. You just pick and choose what and what not to use. And based on Echo, it looks like Marvel Studios is doing just that. They even used the former Netflix footage in the promos for this show and maybe even the show itself. So do you think this debate is settled once and for all about Kingpin and Daredevil being the same characters? 

I think it is. During our restart of all the creative on Daredevil: Born Again, all the creatives got together and said, “Look, this is how we’ve got to do it now.” So we are for sure only speaking about it in terms of being directly connected to the original Daredevil, and that’s a great thing. It brings in a lot of cool stories and all the collateral story that happened in those original three seasons. So we now get to start this Born Again situation with all of that history behind us and the outcome of all that history. So we’re all talking about Daredevil: Born Again in those terms now.

Yeah, the essence and spirit of those past shows is more important than recreating exact details, and hopefully, the Internet recognizes that before scrutinizing the differing hammers that Wilson Fisk used on each show. On Daredevil, he used a claw hammer to kill his father, while Echo had him utilize a ball-peen hammer. Are you dreading any potential hairsplitting discourse?

I’ve been acting for forty-something years, and so I’m used to working with many different kinds of creative people. The best ones have a completely unique look at things, and so it never surprises me when things change a bit from project to project. It just doesn’t. The most we can do is be very savvy when it comes to the canon of these characters, Daredevil and Kingpin. We need to be on it when it comes to the right tone, and we need to give them what they’re looking for when it comes to this kind of storytelling. It’s different from the other stuff. Neither of us have superpowers, and we’re not from outer space. We’re character-driven story characters. That’s the way we were presented originally, and that’s the idea now. So all of the artists and creatives behind this stuff are going to change things slightly to make our story interesting.

But I love it that everybody has things to say. I get told all kinds of crazy stuff and I just love it. I love that they’re paying attention. I love that everybody has their opinions and that they would rather it be this way or that way. As an actor, I can’t answer all of that stuff, but I can bring a performance forward for them that they’re going to appreciate. So the rest is just the world that these movies and shows live in. There’s a big, strong fanbase, and that’s what makes these movies and shows survive. So, complain away, have opinions, do whatever you want to do. I love the excitement, and it doesn’t bother me. But every creative person I’ve ever met is unique, and they should be allowed to make unique choices. So it doesn’t bother me [what people say] whether I agree with them or not.

Maya tried to use her powers to heal Fisk’s childhood pain, and while it might seem premature to take that defining characteristic away from him at this early stage in your MCU career, do you think she succeeded? 

That’s a good question, but I can’t answer that question. That question is boxed up in a lot of other stuff, and I can’t open that box.

“What did you do!?” The way he responded to her suggests that he knows he feels different, different enough to run for public office? Do you think her powers somehow had a hand in his decision to run for mayor?

No, I don’t think that. I want to do the right thing here and say something that is true, but not too revealing. I don’t think he’s changed; I think he’s enlightened. I haven’t seen a lot of the episodes of Echo. So, in my mind, after everything goes down with Maya, he gets on a plane, and the news is playing on the plane. It says, “New York is going to be looking for a new mayor soon,” and as he’s watching it, a light bulb goes on. So, by the end of that flight, he decides, “If I want to be all powerful, this is what I’m going to do.” That’s the most I can tell you.

Fisk killed Maya’s father; she retaliated by shooting him in the face and blowing up his armory. He then tracked her down to Oklahoma and pleaded with her to come back to help run his empire. She refused, so he threatened to kill her whole family. And all the while, he never bothered to learn her language. Is his attachment to her more about control than some semblance of love?

When I was young, I thought I knew how to love: family, friends, partners. But a lot of that was about control. So you learn the hard way that love shouldn’t be about control, and it’s pretty obvious that for a lot of people that love each other, control is involved in that. So that can cause problems, big problems, and in this case, and many cases throughout life, it’s both until you learn how to love better.

You mentioned the Daredevil: Born Again reset earlier, and I thought it was wise to rip the Band-Aid off when you did, versus trying to manufacture a new tone or story in post-production. Did you and Charlie Cox have more of your signature two-hour phone calls when all of that stuff went down?

Yeah, I don’t want to go there.

It sounds like you’ve enjoyed Benson and Moorhead’s previous work on Moon Knight and Loki. Have you met with your new Born Again directors yet? 

I’m a huge fan of those guys, and I talk to them all the time now. I’m so happy that they’re doing this show. I’m just so happy about it. When I heard that, I was like, “OK, not only are we switching things up, but the bosses are doing the right thing for us.” They’ve given us their hottest talent, and that’s pretty cool. So the first thing I did was thank them. I thanked Kevin [Feige] for doing that and sticking with Charlie and I. It’s a pretty amazing thing.

I fell in love with a question years ago, but I never really got a satisfying answer to it. It was basically, “What happens when you and your scene partner have opposing acting techniques? Who compromises?” However, I finally got a great answer to the question the one time I didn’t ask it, and it was courtesy of one Matthew Modine. 

(D’Onofrio smiles.)

He told me that the two of you butt heads on Full Metal Jacket, partially because he was Adler and you were Strasberg. What’s happened since then when your technique happens to clash with somebody else’s? Who adjusts to whom?

Well, nobody adjusts. You can’t drop your technique. You both just do the best you can to make the scene work. First of all, I’ve always believed that technique is only there if you need it. Experience helps a lot, because the longer you act, the better actor you are. That’s my opinion of myself and my friends. Some of my friends have become incredible actors over time. They were always good, but now they’re the best actors around in my opinion. Sometimes, you can just go in and do the part and feel good about it, and everybody feels good about it. And sometimes, you need a technique. My technique happens to be method acting. But the thing about butting heads is that as long as you’re getting the job done to the best of your ability, you’re doing the right thing. I don’t think anybody has to succumb to the other one. It’s a work atmosphere, and you have to apply yourself to the scene. I know Matthew believes in this strongly, but our job is to service the story, and so we have to bring to it whatever we can in the best way we can.

Sadly, one of your most notable scene partners, Andre Braugher, passed away recently. Have you revisited your memories from Homicide: Life on the Street a lot the last month? 

Well, I go to these expos now, and I never did anything like that before. I just didn’t get out a lot. So I didn’t know a lot of actors, but in the last year, I’ve met and talked with some of my favorite actors ever. In the theater world, you see familiar faces. You get to talk with people in New York, and a bunch of us get together every once in a while. So I have that kind of camaraderie with New York actors, but in the business itself, the Hollywood side of the whole thing, I don’t have that circle of friends. I did when I was younger for a short period of time, but I don’t anymore.

So, nowadays, I get to do these expos, and I get to spend time with men and women that are really good at their jobs. We talk about the jobs that we’ve done and what’s meaningful to us. And, yeah, Andre has come up a lot. He was quite an actor. He was really something. He was much more experienced than I was when we did that show. His chops were twice mine, easily. So I have those kinds of memories, and I’m still good friends with Gary Fleder, the director of [Homicide: Life on the Street’s “The Subway”]. In fact, Gary was the one who told me that Andre passed.

So a lot of people still remember that show and that particular episode, and when I’m at these expos, people will come up to me and say, “It’s my favorite piece of television that I’ve ever seen.” And the minute somebody brings that episode up, the first thing I see is Andre’s face. It’s not because he passed away; it’s just because of who he was when he was alive and where we were in life and what he brought to the table every day. That piece is like a two-hander. It’s just him and I. There are some other scenes with other actors, but I didn’t meet anybody else. I only met Andre, and we were there on that platform for four days, I think. So I’ve been thinking about him a lot.

***
Echo is now streaming on Disney+ and Hulu.

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