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Yahya Abdul-Mateen II knew he wanted to do a Marvel project, but he wondered if Wonder Man was it as he mulled an offer to play its lead character.

“Man, I was over there, looking over the fence, waiting for a chance to come play in Marvel world,” Mateen recalled Saturday to a rapt audience at The Hollywood Reporter’s Frontrunners panel regarding the Marvel Studios show, which has emerged, much like its titular character, an underdog and surprise contender, only this time in the real-world Emmy Awards conversation.

“It was so cool what Marvel was building. It was fun, funny and smart. My friends were on the Marvel side. And I really wanted to play,” the star recounted, one of anecdotes that had the industry crowd at the San Vicente Bungalows laughing and leaning in.

He had already met with the show’s two creators, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings filmmaker Destin Daniel Cretton and Community and Brooklyn Nine-Nine writer Andrew Guest. Both men had seen Abdul-Mateen in the Broadway play Topdog/Underdog and knew he could play Simon Williams, the actor chasing his dream in Hollywood who was also hiding doubt and superpowers. 

But still, Abdul-Mateen had some questions for Marvel chief Kevin Feige. 

“I said, ‘I still need to talk to Fiege,’” Abdul-Mateen recounted. “To make sure that this actually made sense for me to do. And my reps did not want me to bug him for a conversation. And I said, ‘No, I need to talk to him.’ They said, ‘Maybe somebody else, and I said ‘Get him on the phone or I’m going to say no.’ 

He finally got his conversation.

“I asked him, ‘I only get one Marvel buck to spend. Is this worth my dollar, because I can wait.’ And he said, ‘No, trust me, it will be worth it.’ And I’m so glad this is the role I got to spend my dollar on because I’m getting all of the super stuff and I’m getting all of the human stuff at the same time.”

Wonder Man marks a departure for the superhero factory’s usual punch-‘em-ups that it took many by surprise. Critics fell for the low-key show when Marvel released all eight episodes at once in January.

“One of the things that has been really rewarding is people who don’t think they like Marvel shows, or who have nothing to do with Marvel, find themselves watching it and binging it,” said Guest. “My mother’s therapist, the last person who would watch a Marvel show, texted her, ‘I stayed up all night, I’ve never binged a show, I watched the whole thing.’”

Abdul-Mateen said he has watched reaction videos to the show, and he even has watched his own work on the show, something that usually he does only years after delivering a performance. He has been moved by many viewers who have connected with his character’s journey in pursuing a dream.  

“I get messages all the time about people who on their way to somewhere and they feel sometimes like giving up, or that they feel not seen, or they feel like they are all alone. Or maybe they have pivoted into a different direction,” he said. “And through watching Simon, they are rooting for him and hoping that he didn’t make the same choice and that’s been able to light a fire under them. Or not even a fire, maybe just protect their candle. Protect their light from going out. It’s reached people from all walks of life, and not just in the creative field.”

When asked about the acting process he took on — was he an actor playing an actor who was a bad actor, as well as an actor playing an actor who has a good actor? —  Mateen revealed he stripped that kind of thinking away. Instead, he focused on Williams’ fears and insecurities. 

“Acting was his safe space. Everything else was the physical negotiation of what was going on on the inside,” Abdul-Mateen explained. “So I never thought playing of an actor being an actor because all of that would be too complex for me and the camera would pick that up.”

While discussing the delicate tone of the show and its balance of being a satire on the Hollywood movie business and a love letter to chasing your dream, Cretton said the creative team focused on character to find their way. And one focal point was an early scene of Williams watching a special movie with his father.

“The only person that really believed in him was his dad, who’s no longer with him,” Cretton explained. “That to me is the heart of this season. And that connection, to movies, is rooted to the connection to a person that he loves. And there’s nothing more relatable for me than that moment, sitting in a theater with someone that you love. The movie becomes the most important thing in your life because of the person you’re sitting next to and that experience you had that day.”

That conversation thread opened up a reveal in which Abdul-Mateen was hit with the realization that the only movie he remembers seeing with his father was The League of the Extraordinary Gentlemen, the 2003 movie adapting the Alan Moore-written comic.

“It was because of that, for the longest time, League of the Extraordinary Gentlemen was, like, my faaaaavorite movie. And it was because I saw it with my dad. It had nothing to do with the movie. It had to do with the guy I was sitting next to, when I was so young.”

Another highlight of the panel was Mateen’s recounting of the first time he met Sir Ben Kingsley, the Oscar-winning and Shakespearean thespian known for his monk-like devotion to the acting craft and to what’s written on the page. 

As Cretton and Guest looked on and occasionally interjected, Abdul-Mateen described a tough first Zoom meeting that left him feeling slighted. 

“I wanted to introduce myself to the guy who would be my partner,” the actor said. “(Kingsley) let me know quickly that he don’t need a thing. He (was) not going to need a thing from me. And if I wanted to make any changes to the script, that I’d better do it now because he’s putting those words in his head and once they go in, it is stones. That is what he said.”

Abdul-Mateen paused. 

“I was like, Oh, OK. All right. I will talk to you later. I will let you get back to your glass of wine. That lit a fire under me. I was like, I don’t think Sir Ben knows who he’s dealing with,’” recalled Abdul-Mateen.

Later, in rehearsals and in production, the two became “in cahoots,” as he described, and “formed a partnership that allowed us to advocate for those characters.”

“We were establishing a relationship and finding one another in between action and cut,” he said, aided by a series that was shooting in order.

Which brings us to the second season, which was announced to the delightful surprise of many in March. Guest said writing has begun, although it is in the early stages. He said to expect a similar tone.  

“The people who like this show and like it because it feels different are going to be rewarded,” said Guest. “And the people who think that this show is going to suddenly turn into something else, I’m sorry to say, it’s not.”

Added Guest: “Simon still has super powers. It still about this relationship, about two artists, and our industry. That is essentially what we want to maintain.”

This edition of THR Frontrunners is brought to you by Disney+ and Marvel Studios.