Charles Ohanwe (Tr 12) reveals his life as an acting double in Marvel films

The Haileybury Society was delighted to hear from Charles Ohanwe (Tr 12) recently about his career as an acting double for actor Jonathan Majors in a recent Marvel film. It’s a fascinating and inspirational read for any young OH thinking of moving into film. Below, Charles tells his story in his own words…

“To whoever is reading this, student, teachers OH’s alike, I hope you’re having a great day and find this somewhat interesting. My name is Charles Ohanwe (Trevelyan 2012-2017) and this will be a small write up of my experience as an acting double/body double for Jonathan Majors aka Kang The Conqueror in Ant-man and the Wasp: Quantumania. I’ll do my best to keep this as informative as possible without potentially breaching any of the many, many, many NDA’s (Non Disclosure Agreements) I signed.

Landing “the Big One”

I first got the news of the audition on 7th September 2022 when shooting for a different project (it was a music video for a song called ‘Do You Wanna’ by Bintaa out now on all major streaming platforms). Towards the end of the shoot my agent (the best by the way!) Carol called me and said I had to sign an NDA BEFORE I received the slides (script) for the self-tape. This was new so immediately I knew it was a big one. I signed it there and then (thank God for editing documents on the phones of today!) told her I would send it off to her well and truly before the deadline the next day as I usually do.

The next day, 8th September I woke up early (ish) as usual, went to train, shower, read the script and put on clothes I believed would suit the character. At the time I didn’t know the character would be Kang but even despite the code name I was given on the sides, because I’m a huge comics fan I put two and two together that it would be an Ant-Man villain.

Getting things right

As ever, I used one of my brothers to read the lines for me to react to and act to. Now before I go on, usually, it takes a couple takes but I try to stick to three takes and no more than six MAX. This time however, I’m not sure if it was because of the way the script was written and how descriptive it was, I could envision and picture the character so much in my mind that I did it in the first take. I then did two more for casting to have a range to choose from.

I then sent it off in the evening of the same day, well before the deadline as I wanted to be close to the front of submissions for the casting directors. Maybe it’s just in my head but I feel this gives me an edge. So, following the instructions, I sent it to a completely different file and not to my agent which is how all castings usually go. Now if you’re in the acting/ entertainment industry you know that it is rife with rejections and so I tried my best to forget that I just sent off an audition for a Disney/ Marvel production. I’ll let you imagine how easy that was.

Body measurements please!

The NEXT day, 9th September I received an email from MARVEL asking for my body measurements as they potentially needed them. These were very specific measurements such as head size, thigh width etc etc. At the time I was with my girlfriend and I didn’t have access to my wardrobe so I was scrambling around looking through the clothes I was wearing for my sizes for various things, I just made an educated guess for my head size as my girlfriend and family insist on reminding me that my head is physically fairly large, so I guess I have them to thank for that.

I had to send a couple as they wanted more measurements and eventually it was all clear. Now as if scripted my agent called me after to tell me I’d been shortlisted and that I was going to find out on Monday if I’d got the part or not. The longest weekend of my life then ensued, constituting of multiple long walks and training sessions to pass the time.

An anxious wait…

On the Monday I told my parents, before I’d been confirmed or denied for the role by the way, that I would tell them some good news. 9:00 am rolled by, no news, then 12:00pm, then 2:00 and still no news. As you can probably imagine I was thinking that I’d massively jumped the gun here with all the positivity talk until around 3-5 pm (it’s hazy with excitement, my apologies) rolled by and I received a call from my agent saying I got the part.

A massive surprise!

Now I’d like to think of myself as cool and collected when receiving good news but I let myself down big time here by shouting as if I didn’t have neighbours. I eventually had to be told to calm down by my agent before she started shouting with excitement too and was talked through the 2 week shoot days, pay, travel, 17 more NDAs (I exaggerate but they were a lot) etc etc. I was needed on set literally the next day to block (basically set up) the scene with THE DIRECTOR PAYTON REED and JONATHAN (descriptive expletive of your choice) MAJORS! Again arguably the longest night of my life with packing and double checking everything ensued even though we were only filming in the UK.

Tinted windows

The NDAs I signed mean that from hear on in I need to be careful about what I say. The next morning I was up bright and early, showered and changed, refused a kiss and hug from my mum and dad as I’m in the big leagues now (I got them anyway cos why not?) and went outside to see an all black Mercedes with tinted windows waiting for me. Once outside, the driver got out of the car and opened the back passenger side. I thanked him (shout out to my parents and Haileybury CCF for instilling manners in me the hard way) and I got in, purple LED’s phone chargers and all, I was thinking “I could get used to this”.

My own trailer!

I was driven to the studios and turns out I HAD A TRAILER kitted out with my VFX costume, mo cap, dressing gown, tote bag, bathroom, couch, mirror and of course my mini fridge (throwback to boarding and uni days).

I was then driven to set FROM my trailer to meet Majors and Reed. Once in, I and my scene partner Theo – who was in as much shock, excitement and giddiness as me I’m sure – walked up to meet them and discuss things.

We were beckoned over by Majors and we were actually discussing the scene, like that was actually happening, back and forth conversation and everything!

To cut a long story short, that was the most out of scene interaction we had with Majors till the last 2 days of shooting due to the busy nature of filming.

Awe-inspiring!

Without being TOO descriptive, the efficiency of the set designers and everyone was awe-inspiring. I also got to meet the security of Samuel L Jackson on previous Marvel sets who proceeded to confirm he was as cool as I suspected.

On my first day on set I was also approached by the head and deputy head of content creation and security for Marvel who calmly stressed to me how important my keeping quiet was and how if I ever leaked any information I would never work in the industry again.

It was at that point that I mentally swore a vow of silence to Marvel and Ant-man 3. I was so excited just to be there and experience everything. PAs were bringing food to my trailer, I had mornings alone to play music on my speaker and get dotted up for VFX by the makeup team (see photograph). During the day I would go over my scenes with my scene partner Theo so we could impress the director – oh, and the the food, I can’t forget the food, it was unbelievable. I also feel the experience of being on a Marvel set heightened everything, maybe it’s just me.

Sparring with Jonathan Majors!

Fast forward to the last day, after we wrapped the whole shoot for the end credits one of the best moments in my life happened; it involved Jonathan Majors and I having an impromptu light, open hand sparring match.

To provide some context, after I left Haileybury I decided to take up boxing and stuck with it for about 5 years. Anyone who knows me, knows that it has now become part of my personality and so in between takes I would lightly shadow box, keyword being lightly as even though I needed to move around the space, I still wanted to have a job by the end of this experience.

Jonathan must have taken notice of this and after we had wrapped he came up to me and started bouncing on his feet, getting into stance, this was followed by him asking me “it’s you right?” Then throwing some jabs. I immediately knew what was happening and got into stance too. I noticed the director’s hands were clasped together in a silent prayer as anything could happen and this made me chuckle, inwardly of course.

We were throwing for a while and then I got hit near the top of my left eye by a jab. Now some of the crew who were filtering out were beginning to surround Jonathan and I had to turn up the heat just a tad so I faked a jab to the body, Majors dropped his guard to block said jab but I stopped halfway and came over the top with an OPEN HANDED, VERY CONTROLLED (as you can see I want to keep this career) left hook which landed square on the side of his face.

I immediately thought “this was nice while this lasted” and looked at his face for a reaction or a “get off the set” from the director. Instead I was met with a “bring it on” nod and we kept throwing, then hugged it out afterwards. He and the director told Theo and I that we did a good job for the shoot , though I’m sure Majors was just being nice as the amount of professionalism, humility, humour and goodwill that he and the rest of the cast and crew displayed will forever be ingrained in my mind and I have no choice but to replicate that in all my future shoots.

Thank you!

I would also love to say a big thank you to the 1st AD Andy, James and Tom the production assistants for helping Theo and I feel immensely comfortable on this shoot and it was an honour and pleasure. Also to the chefs on set as the food was absolutely delicious every, single, day.

Another big thank you to Haileybury for the skills I developed by taking part in multiple Co-curricular ventures like plays, CCF, MUN and Public Speaking competitions as they helped nurture and shape my character which enabled me to take on any situation with full confidence.

If you read this far, thank you for your patience at my ramblings. The plan is in fact to be doing more of these on a larger scale with bigger productions and be a source of inspiration for any who would like to follow this challenging but immensely rewarding career path. Thank you again for taking time out of your day to read this and I wish you greatness in all your endeavours.”

Best,

Charles Ohanwe

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