ComingSoon’s Jonathan Sim recently spoke with Wendy Jacobson, executive producer of the upcoming Marvel Studios film Deadpool & Wolverine. They talked about the work of an executive producer, the on-set vibe of the upcoming sequel, and her work in the MCU, starting with She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.
“Wolverine is recovering from his injuries when he crosses paths with the loudmouth Deadpool,” reads the summary. “They team up to defeat a common enemy.” The film arrives in theaters on July 26, 2024.
Jonathan Sim: I want to talk to you a little bit about your career and a lot of this stuff that led up to this moment. I believe that you started working with Marvel on She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.
Wendy Jacobson: That is correct, yes.
I wanted to know what the phone call was like when you first found out that you’d be working with Marvel Studios and then on this film.
That’s a really good question. You know, someone had called me, a friend of mine and said Marvel was looking for producers for streaming series. And I had never done a TV show before. I had never done anything streaming, but I was the biggest fan of Marvel. So, of course, I was gonna take that call and, you know, started sitting down with all of these people. And it’s really interesting because I couldn’t kind of meet anyone. I’m like, let me have a coffee with someone from Marvel. It was like Fort Knox trying to figure out what was there. But as soon as I started interviewing every person that I met with, you know, besides being in total reverence of everything they had done and being a little intimidated and freaked out, they were all just so cool and chill.
And so it made me really wanna work there. And then my first day that I got the job, I was thrilled, and I went into [Kevin Feige‘s] office, and he said, “Everyone works at one project at a time here, and you are gonna work on She-Hulk,” which I really didn’t know much about at the time. And then I started reading the comics and was just blown away. I thought it was so cool. And it was this kind of audacious woman who broke the fourth wall and yelled at her writers when she wasn’t happy with the storyline, you know, and we primarily focused on the Dan Slott run as the basis for our show.
And Jessica Gau had such an incredible take on the material, and it was something that was really easy for me to connect with because it was about a woman in her thirties living in LA navigating, you know, her career and her dating life and happened to be a superhero. So it was really an awesome whirlwind and first step into the Marvel universe for me.
One of the things that’s existed for a long time is a lot of people know a general idea of the positions and what they’re called in movies. But they don’t really know what each person does. I have a vague idea of what an executive producer does, but I want to hear in your words, what does the executive producer of Deadpool & Wolverine do?
You know, it’s different for every producer on every movie, and it really depends on the filmmakers you have, right? But when you’ve got an experienced director like Shawn Levy at the helm, and you’ve got Ryan Reynolds who is, you know, the DNA and the heart and soul of this franchise, and truly the north star of the tone and you’ve got Hugh Jackman, my role is really just to support their vision and help turn their dreams into reality.
I pride myself on taking anything off of their plate that I can, big or small because I want those guys to focus on purely the magic that they’re making on set every day. I don’t want them worried about anything else. Because it’s truly like watching Ryan and Hugh channel things from the Divine when they’re riffing with each other, so that’s my primary job during filming. But also the other one is there’s so many decisions that have to be made on a film, particularly of this size, and you have to make sure everyone who’s on set and the people who can’t be there every day like Kevin Feige and Louis D’Esposito are all on the same page every day. So I’m constantly just making sure everyone’s in communication and happy and that we’re all one big family.
Were there any fun challenges you found with Deadpool & Wolverine that you weren’t used to and were surprised by?
I don’t know if I would call it a fun challenge. The biggest kind of shock to the system of this whole movie was coming back in the wintertime after the strikes. You know, we’d shot half the movie, which had been designed for a summer shoot. I mean, particularly the actors and their costumes. We were now coming back to 20-degree weather, sometimes less in London. And you know, we had footage in the can that had to match. We couldn’t just put everyone in jackets at that point. So that was a really big challenge that we rallied around to figure out. And we had an army of costumers standing by with parkas like this at the ready to wrap everyone up as soon as they said cut. And we had tents and heating tubes, and that was a big one. And we also lost three, four hours of daylight every day. So that was, that was a big one to overcome. But it was great. And it was part of the experience, you know, that’s imprinted on our soul making this movie.
Definitely. Are there any upcoming MCU projects that you are particularly excited for and/or would want to work on?
I’m excited for all of our upcoming projects, and I’m like racking my brain, like what’s been announced, what am I gonna get in trouble for saying I’m excited about? Yeah. I will work on anything that my boss has allowed me to work on. And I’ve had two incredible opportunities so far, and I’m looking forward to what’s next.
May you describe what the vibe is on Deadpool & Wolverine, just on any given day on set? What is it like to be working on that set?
I have to tell you my colleague and co-producer Mitch Bell said that this movie was like a unicorn. And I think that’s the best way to describe it, because not only are you working on Deadpool & Wolverine, which is just exciting in and of itself, not only is the script in fantastic shape, like everyone feels like they’re making a great movie when they come to work every day, but everyone really was just so excited to be there. And there was such a loving feeling and friendship among everyone on the set.
And I actually remember one day being in the tent talking with some of my colleagues, having this very conversation about, like, isn’t it crazy how much everyone loves this movie and also loves each other? And then, one of the prop PAs walked by. And she said, “Oh my God. I was just telling my friend that usually, on every set, there’s one person that I can’t stand or I don’t like, and there is no one on this movie.” So it just was like this special, magical, happy unicorn of an experience.
