Even if you’re a great actor like Jared Harris, with nothing left to prove, there are always bills to pay. This is why he agreed to play in this Marvel film released in 2022, widely panned by critics…
You can be a great actor and still be obliged to have cheap artistic pretensions from time to time because you have to keep the pot boiling. Take Jared Harris for example. Terrific as King George VI in the series The Crown; extraordinary in the mini series Chernobyl where he played the scientist Valeri Legassov; also excellent in the Mad Men series, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button by David Fincher…
And then there is Morbius, released in 2022. In this Marvel adaptation, he plays Emil Nikos, friend and scientific mentor of Doctor Michael Morbius, who will be the victim of the mutation of his unfortunate companion.
“I have a mortgage to pay you know. Sometimes you accept an offer just because you need the money” commented the actor, on the microphone of the British site I, when the journalist asked him why he accepted a role in this film which was more than widely panned by critics, in addition to being a big failure at the box office office, raising only $167 million. This shows that the fangs of the vampire Morbius have been quite worn…
Released on a massive 4,268 screens in the United States, it was only showing in 83 theaters eight weeks later. In a rather strange move on the part of Sony, the film was re-released on screens ten weeks after its initial release, going from 83 theaters to 1017. No luck. The flop was so massive that Sony pulled the plug on its film after a week…
Why was the film such a failure? Harris has his own idea: “I’ve observed that these kinds of films do well if you have a sense of humor. You can’t treat it like it’s Shakespeare. So yes, this film could have benefited from a sense of more mischievous humor.
