Agatha All Along‘s Joe Locke Is Thrilled to Be Playing a Campy Marvel Witch

While Marvel fans inactive don’t cognize precisely who Joe Locke is playing successful Agatha All Along—officially his character’s sanction is “Teen,” though speculation has narrowed it down a batch much than that—the Heartstopper breakout is precise assured astir what he’s bringing to the array successful the WandaVision spin-off. In a caller interview, helium talked astir playing a queer quality successful the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and what it means to him some personally and professionally.

Speaking to Variety, Locke says Agatha All Along has made him little acrophobic astir being typecast arsenic a cheery character, due to the fact that the relation helium has is truthful analyzable and multi-faceted. “The amusement ne'er shies distant from his queerness, but it’s not a defining diagnostic of his character,” helium told the trade. “It’s conscionable 1 furniture of him arsenic a person.”

Elsewhere successful the article, Agatha Harkness herself, Kathryn Hahn, recalls however soon aft she started moving with Locke she was impressed with his consciousness of self. “He corrected maine aboriginal on, due to the fact that I said, ‘’hese witches and this gorgeous wizard,'” she recalled to Variety. “And helium was like, ‘No, we’re all witches.’ That truly stuck with me.”

Though Locke considers being successful a Marvel bid “the most pinch me thing,” he’s besides acceptable to look naysayers—even chap members of the LGBTQ+ community—who person taken from the Agatha All Along trailers that his show arsenic “Teen” (or whoever helium ends up being) volition beryllium a “campy cheery stereotype.” He explained wherefore that didn’t beryllium close with him.

“It truly annoyed maine due to the fact that I was like, ‘You can’t inquire for authentic casting and past beryllium upset if you person a campy character’ … I’m afloat alert that the Marvel fandom is acold little bully than the Heartstopper fandom,” helium said. “There’s going to beryllium a batch of radical that conscionable hatred everything astir the quality and everything astir what I’ve done with it, and I conscionable person to beryllium OK with that.”

And if Agatha All Along includes philharmonic numbers, arsenic has been rumored, Locke’s theatrical talents volition travel successful other handy; earlier this year, helium starred arsenic Tobias Ragg—following Stranger Things‘ Gaten Matarazzo—in the Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.

Agatha All Along, which besides stars Sasheer Zamata, Ali Ahn, Patti LuPone, Debra Jo Rupp, Emma Caulfield Ford, and Aubrey Plaza, was created by Jac Schaeffer (Black Widow, WandaVision). It volition tally a full of 9 episode, and volition debut with a two-episode premiere September 18 connected Disney+.

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