When you play a superhero, you probably expect to be hit a few times during filming by other actors and stunt performers who are working opposite you in an action scene. What you don’t expect, though, is for a random pedestrian to come up and smack you while you’re minding your own business and preparing for the role. Still, this is what happened to Charlie Cox while he was researching how to play Matt Murdock on Daredevil.
The star of the Marvel/Netflix show was attending Las Vegas Comic-Con when he was asked by a fan what was the most challenging part of portraying the Man Without Fear. Just as you’d expect, Cox replied that it was playing someone who’s blind. As the actor explained how he did some thorough research for the part, he told the story of how he was once hit by a passer-by who misunderstood the situation.
Here’s what he had to say:
“The visually impaired aspect is probably the most tricky. I worked with a guy called Joe Strechay, who’s become a good friend of mine. He’s been legally blind for 20 years. I just spent a lot of time with him, working with him, filming him. A woman in the street once hit me because I was filming him. I was filming him with his permission, because I was trying to learn his cane technique, but she didn’t know that. This woman in New York thought I was filming a blind man. And she came up to me and went, ‘Oy, that’s rude!’ And then she hit me.”
To be fair to the woman, she was just looking out for Strechay and admonishing Cox for, as it probably looked to her, mocking a visually-impaired man. How was she supposed to know he was just filming him to prepare for a role?
For Cox’s part, though, his extensive research and friendship with Strechay paid off, as his physical performance as Matt Murdock is terrific. He’s previously spoken before about the challenges of not looking his fellow actors in the eye when filming, as that’s usually a key element of any piece of drama, but he’s mastered that, too. He’s even been honored by The American Foundation for the Blind for his performance.
Thankfully, Cox will soon get to impress us again when Daredevil season 3 arrives on Netflix at some point later this year.
