Actor Hugo Weaving, known for his role in The Lord of the Rings films, as well as Johann Schmidt, aka Red Skull, in Captain America: The First Avenger, was all set to return for future films as the villain Red Skull in future MCU films. But the Red Skull who appeared in Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame was voiced by Ross Marquand. So why didn’t Weaving return?
According to Weaving in an interview with timeout, there was some major miscommunication between the actor and the MCU executives. When asked about the fact that the filmmakers said they did try to get Weaving to return for the final films, he explained:
‘Oh, yeah. I loved playing that character Red Skull – it was a lot of fun. We were all obliged to sign up for three pictures: I was thinking [Red Skull] probably wouldn’t come back in “Captain America” but he may well come back as a villain in “The Avengers”. By then, they’d pushed back on the contracts that we agreed on and so the money they offered me for “The Avengers” was much less than I got for the very first one, and this was for two films. And the promise when we first signed the contracts was that the money would grow each time. They said: “It’s just a voice job, it’s not a big deal”. I actually found negotiating with them through my agent impossible. And I didn’t really wanna do it that much. But I would have done it.’
That’s so disappointing to hear! He started the character, and he should have been able to see it through. I can understand both sides of the argument. The people who made the contracts didn’t foresee the arc of the character, and how the role was going to change to a smaller part in which they would only need a voice over. But Weaving had been promised something, so it’s not his fault that that’s what he expected.
In the end, Marquand is a fantastic talent, so the part turned out well. But it’s always too bad when an actor can’t see the role they began from start to end.