Iron Man Producer Reveals the Deleted Scenes Marvel Didn’t Want Us to See

Tony Stark never struck us as a particularly private guy. After all, his first movie ends with him doing away with the long-established tradition of superhero secret identities by declaring to the press, “I am Iron Man.” Before and since, he had no problem sharing his loves, foibles and passions with the rest of the world.

And yet, Marvel thought there were some parts of Tony Stark that shouldn’t be shared with the rest of the world, even if director Jon Favreau filmed them for the first MCU movie Iron Man. Speaking with ScreenRant about his most recent movie Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, producer Jeremy Latcham admitted that there are deleted scenes that Marvel still won’t release, even 15 years after the movie hit theaters.

According to Latcham, these “three or four deleted scenes” follow “a whole runner in Iron Man where Tony Stark was doing laundry and I don’t think they’ve ever come out.” Why would Favreau need multiple scenes of Iron Man doing laundry? Because they tie into Tony’s escape from the Ten Rings. “Tony is doing laundry for the captors,” Latcham explained; “but he’s really breaking the washing machine and stealing parts from it to build the Mark 1 suit.”

When considering which deleted scenes to include on home video releases of Iron Man, Latcham suggested the inclusion of the laundry scenes. But Kevin Feige stepped in, telling him, “No. We can never put out Abu doing laundry. People will know we don’t know what we’re doing. It’ll be embarrassing if they see these scenes.”

On one hand, it’s easy to understand Feige’s trepidation. At the time, Iron Man was a huge gamble for Marvel Studios, as the beleaguered company (not owned by Disney until 2009) had put up rights to its core characters — including the Hulk and Captain America — as collateral for a huge loan a few years earlier. If Iron Man tanked, Marvel as we knew it would cease to exist.

Furthermore, while Jon Favreau had already directed the instant classic Elf and the cult hit Made, Robert Downey Jr. was still seen as a liability, having only recently recovered from crippling substance addiction. To make matters riskier, Downey Jr. and Favreau had attempted an improvisational approach to making the movie, largely throwing away the dialogue in the script to emphasize banter between the characters, which led to the infamous “I am Iron Man” ending.

In short, Feige knew that he and his collaborators were making a different type of superhero movie. Having worked on many pre-MCU Marvel movies, including X-Men and Spider-Man, Feige knew what fans wanted, and pushed for more comics-accurate and shared-universe takes on the characters. But Tony’s laundry room escapades were just too far.

Of course, those concerns proved unnecessary, as Marvel continues to dominate the box office, even as audiences are beginning to show signs of superhero fatigue. But for Latcham, the scenes just don’t work. “It’s so absurd. It’s wild,” he stated, proving that some things are too weird, even for Tony Stark.