Since he bid farewell to the Marvel Cinematic Universe when Tony Stark sacrificed his own life to save the universe in Avengers: Endgame, Robert Downey Jr. has been carefully weighing up many options in terms of his next move in front of the camera, but we’ve had plenty of incessant speculation about an double-quick comeback as Iron Man to tide us over in the interim.
The actor’s first post-MCU venture didn’t end too well after Dolittle was torn apart by critics and almost instantly labeled a genuine contender for the title of 2020’s worst movie, even though it premiered in the third week of January. Not even extensive reshoots and rewrites could polish this particular turd, which flopped hard at the box office.
It was announced in July that not only had RDJ settled on his next gig, but it sounded as though it had the potential to see him tap back into his roots as a chameleonic and versatile character actor. The two-time Academy Award nominee signed on to play not just one, but multiple roles in HBO’s The Sympathizer including a California Congressman, a CIA agent, a Hollywood film director and more.
Downey Jr. remains the only talent attached to the project so far, but it’s now been reported that the 56 year-old is set to earn $2 million per episode for his contributions, an eye-watering figure when you consider he’s not actually the main character. Instead, The Sympathizer focuses on a half-French, half-Vietnamese Communist spy during the war and his subsequent exile in the United States, and it’s also got a hell of a director in place with Oldboy and Snowpiercer‘s Park Chan-wook calling the shots.
