Marvel Star Russell Crowe Slams Dakota Johnson’s Madame Web Comments

Russell Crowe, who most recently played Zeus in Thor: Love and Thunder had some sage advice for Dakota Johnson who slammed her own movie Madame Web as being “made by committee.”

“You cannot make art based on numbers and algorithms,” Johnson previously told GQ in an interview. “My feeling has been for a long time that audiences are extremely smart, and executives have started to believe that they’re not. Audiences will always be able to sniff out bull—t. Even if films start to be made with AI, humans aren’t going to f–king want to see those.”

Crowe responded: “I don’t want to make any comments to what anybody else might have said or what their experience is, but… you’re bringing out the impish quality of my humor. [Laughs.] You’re telling me you signed up for a Marvel movie, and some [frick]ing universe for cartoon characters… and you didn’t get enough pathos?”

Crowe added: “Not quite sure how I can make this better for you. It’s a gigantic machine, and they make movies at a certain size. And you know, I’ve experienced that on the DC side with Man of Steel, Zack Snyder, and I’ve experienced it on the Marvel side via Disney with Thor: Love and Thunder … These are jobs. You know: Here’s your role, play the role. If you’re expecting this to be some kind of life-changing event, I just think you’re here for the wrong reasons.”

Crowe continued: “It can be challenging, working in a bluescreen world, when you have to convince yourself of a lot more than just the internal machinations of your character. But for anything to be … and you can’t make this a direct comment on her because I don’t know her and I don’t know what she went through, and the fact that you can have a shit experience on a film … Yeah, you can. But is that the Marvel process? I’m not sure you can say that. I haven’t had a bad experience. I mean [on Thor], OK, it’s a Marvel movie, but it’s Taika Waititi’s world, and it was just a gas every day, being silly. And then, with J.C. Chandor on Kraven, I’m just bringing a little weight to the circumstances, so the young actors have got an actor they can bounce off … You know, so many of these directors have a certain skill level — freaking genius people. Think about what’s required, right? … Whether it’s [Proof director] Jocelyn Moorhouse or it’s Ridley Scott, you’re talking about hanging out with geniuses.”

Crowe will next be seen in Sony’s Kraven the Hunter on December 13.