Don Cheadle Was Given One Hour to Join the MCU
Don Cheadle initially had just one hour to decide if he wanted to commit to eight Marvel movies.
Don Cheadle was accepted as the MCU’s War Machine faster than you can say “Terrence who?” and it turns out that he originally had to accept the role pretty damn quickly, too.
The Black Monday actor and prolific Twitter ass kicker stopped by Late Night With Seth Meyers this week to chat about all sorts of things, but it was hard not to focus on the revelation that he was given just one hour to decide if he wanted to take over the part of James ‘WARMACHINEROX with an X, all caps’ Rhodes in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, starting with Jon Favreau’s Iron Man 2.
“I was at my daughter’s birthday party and I got a call and they said, ‘OK, it’s gonna happen. The offer is going to you. But we need this to happen kinda quickly, so we’re gonna give you an hour to decide,’” Cheadle told a surprised audience. “I said, ‘An hour? It’s like eight movies!’”
He then joked that after he objected to an hour time limit, they stretched it to two.
At one point, it did look like Cheadle might be done as Tony Stark’s BFF Rhodey in the MCU, having been accidentally shot down by Vision during the massive Avengers face-off two-thirds of the way through 2016’s Captain America: Civil War. However, he seemed to be completely recovered by the events of Avengers: Infinity War, and unless we get a throwaway line in Avengers: Endgame about the extensive healing process the character went through and his no doubt long r(h)oad(es) to recovery, that might just end up being one of the MCU’s dangling plot threads.
Cheadle also had another Avengers-themed story for host Meyers on the same night, as he recalled a ‘boys night out’ at a burlesque club in London where he’d been worried they’d all be recognized, only to get a bit annoyed when no one even noticed them…
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Kirsten Howard has paid their dues. Yes sir, the check is in the mail.