Kumail Nanjiani has had one heck of a run in the last decade, breaking through with Oscar-nominated films like The Big Sick, to comedies like Stuber and Driver’s Edto voicing animated characters in hits like DreamWorks’ Migration and Andy Serkis’s adaptation of Animal Farm. However, Nanjiani’s biggest breakout came five years ago when he joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Oscar-winner Chloe Zhao’s Eternals (2021). As Kingo, an alien immortal masquerading as a Bollywood star, Nanjiani was a fan favorite in a film not necessarily favored by fans.
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The latest role that Kumail Nanjiani has taken on is that of the lead agent in the “Special Litter Unit (S.L.U.),” the fictional organization at the center of Purina Tidy Cats’ new crime procedural-themed ad campaign, which launched this month. ComicBook got to talk with Nanjiani about the campaign, and the subject of his time in the MCU certainly came up.
Kumail Nanjiani On Lessons Learned From All That Training For Marvel’s Eternals
ComicBook’s Chris Killian made sure to compliment Kumail Nanjiani on the dedication he showed, training to play Kingo in Eternals. The actor made headlines due to his transformation, going from a lovable and handsome funnyman to a hardbody sex symbol funnyman. The transition was as surreal for Nanjiani as it was for his fans; the intense focus on his body was unnerving, whether it was positive affirmation or the sharp increase in aggression from other men (“I just see the little child inside them, like a little child pretending to be a big, strong man,” he said in a previous interview. “It’s laughable, if it wasn’t so f*cking devastating – and causing so many problems in the world.”).
Half a decade after Eternals’release, Nanjiani sounds like he’s reached a whole new level of zen about his Marvel body controversy: “I think the most important thing is just be healthy and yourself; you know, I think those are the most important things. I don’t think any kind of external result from transformation is what you should be looking for. Just find a way to be healthy and to be happy with how you are. I think that’s the most important.”
It’s not hard to understand how Nanjiani has come to that conclusion: Eternalsearned $402 million worldwide at the (post-COVID) box office, but also had a budget over $230 million. It also failed to be the franchise starter that Marvel Studios was banking on, and instead has become a “cul-de-sac” of MCU lore that has shown no signs of getting continuation later in the franchise. In fact, after Avengers: Doomsday and Secret Wars, it’s half expected that Eternals will be one of the series that gets pruned. It’s hard for that result to justify all the intensive work, discipline, and denial (of good food) that it takes to achieve the “Marvel movie body.”
Especially when there’s perfectly good, fun work an actor (and cat dad) could be doing, like a kitty-themed police procedural. Be sure to check out Kumail Nanjiani in Purina Tidy Cat’s “Special Litter Unit” campaign, which is now playing.
5 Years Ago, One of Marvel’s Biggest MCU Failures Actually Helped Define the Brand, For Better And Worse
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