Just when it seemed as if Sony’s Kraven the Hunter film couldn’t get any cooler, charismatic character actor Alessandro Nivola has just been added to the film’s cast. According to Deadline, he’s going to play the primary villain.
Who that villain will be, however, remains to be seen. Sony had no comment on the actor’s casting.
The actor shared his excitement over the casting on Twitter.
Nivola joins the previously announced Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Russell Crowe, Fred Hechinger, and Ariana DeBose. Taylor-Johnson will play the titular character, while Hechinger will play his brother and fellow Spider-Man rogue Dmitri Smerdyakov a.k.a Chameleon. Crowe will play Kraven and Chameleon’s father, while DeBose will play the Marvel character Calypso.
For those unfamiliar with Nivola, he just finished playing a young Dickie Moltisanti in the Sopranos prequel The Many Saints of Newark. Over the years, however, he’s inhabited many big and small roles in numerous other films. Most people might remember him as Billy – and the subsequent memes – from Jurassic Park 3.
J.C. Chandor (Triple Frontier) is directing with Art Marcum, Matt Holloway, and Richard Wenk writing the screenplay. Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach will be producing the film. Taylor-Johnson nabbed the leading role after execs at Sony were thrilled with his performance in the upcoming action flick Bullet Train. Production is expected to start in the coming weeks in the UK.
For those unfamiliar with the character, Sergei Kravenoff was born in Russia and became a big game hunter later in life, mostly in Africa. After drinking a witch doctor’s poison, he gained super-strength, enhanced reflexes, and high stamina. This allowed him to bring down bigger animals such as elephants and Gorillas. After a while, he grew tired of big game hunting, due to it being easy, and focused his attention on Spider-Man. Several defeats later, he became one of six members of the notorious villain team, The Sinister Six.
The film’s tone will reportedly be a mix of Man on Fire and Logan. Kraven The Hunter will hit theaters on January 13, 2023. The film joins a growing list of Spider-verse projects in various stages in development along with Madame Web, Spider-Woman, Morbius, and the ongoing Venom franchise.
SOURCE: Deadline
