Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige Explains Why He Loves Using Indie Directors For MCU Films

In case you were somehow unaware of the existence of Marvel Studios, they are directly responsible for the recent superhero takeover of Hollywood. The studio behind films like “Iron Man,” “Captain America,” and “The Avengers,” has had great success overlaying its interconnected comic book model onto film, creating a multi-year plan that allows for character-based adventures that dovetail into event films. Though Marvel is best known for this in-house approach filmmaking, they’re also known for tapping indie directors to helm their superhero projects. In a new profile of the Russo brothers for Vulture, writer Adam Sternbergh asks Kevin Feige about why he loves to use indie directors for films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

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Feige explains that Marvel thrives on a studio style, which would require directors to come in and create chapters that aesthetically fits with prior works but are still making artistically compelling work. He says that Marvel chooses “from a pool of filmmakers not who have done big, giant films before but who have done interesting things that made us stop and go, ‘That’s cool,'” but that’s only the criterion for a meeting. After that, Feige needs to see “if they’re up to the task of working on something this collaborative and this intensive — because a very expensive, big-budget movie that has a release date is inherently intense.” Their latest success has been with the Russo brothers, who were best known for directing episodes single-camera TV comedies like “Arrested Development” and “Community,” but have had success with 2014’s “Captain America: Winter Solider” and the upcoming “Captain America: Civil War.” Now because of Feige’s storied success with their director pool, it’s considered a reward for an indie director to get the opportunity to direct a big-budget franchise film

By 2019, Marvel Studios will have released 23 films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with only more room for growth.

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