One of the hardest things about bringing Moon Knight to the silver screen was the portrayal of several different characters in the same body but turns out Oscar Isaac’s talent relieved the show’s directors of that worry.
In case you weren’t aware, Moon Knight, the character, lives with Disassociative Identity Disorder (DID). Directors Justin Benson and Maron Moorhead were therefore worried that audiences might have trouble deciphering which alter in control at any given time, but they said after they witnessed Oscar Isaac’s acting, they felt at ease.
In an interview with Screenrant, the directors revealed the complex nature of the character was one of their biggest worries, but Isaac surprised them.
“Yes, that was the biggest surprise to us… Because we were worried as directors, ‘How are we going to tell the audience? Besides the accent, how are we going to know who is who?’ Especially if it’s just a look, because semi-often that does happen, that the alter that is inside is looking.
“We realized on day one that we didn’t need it. Oscar can hold his face and his posture in a way that, as soon as you look at him, you know who he is. And by the way, neither of those two are anything like the real Oscar Isaac, so he had three people going on. That was really interesting as well.”
In fact, Benson and Moorhead said Isaac was so good, it seemed like it was two completely different people when he was working.
“What an unbelievable blessing, both that we didn’t need to work any harder as directors in order to figure out how to keep it clear for the audience – and in fact, we were able to just sit back and in many ways present it as if there were just two physical people standing looking at each other and figuring out their issues. It’s a gift.”
The first episode of Moon Knight is currently streaming on Disney Plus.