Jason Momoa Talks Aquaman’s Diversity

Jason Momoa at the Sundance Film Festival talks to the The Daily Beast on his current projects, his future projects and the most important for those of us, Aquaman. Momoa talks about bring proud to be playing the character of Aquaman and the diversity the character will have with him in the role.

“It’s awesome as an actor to know what your future is going to be because I have children and I’ve busted my ass to put food on the table,” he says. “It’s awesome knowing that I’m going to be in Justice League because my son is the biggest Batman fan and my daughter loves Wonder Woman. It’ll be cool for them to see me in something because they’re not going to be watching Game of Thrones or Red Road anytime soon, but now they can see Daddy kicking ass in IMAX.”

Momoa joins fellow ass-kickers The Rock and Vin Diesel as a new breed of ethnically ambiguous action hero. As a Hawaiian, it wasn’t easy for Momoa to break into Hollywood.

“I’ve had to bust ass to be in this industry. A lot of things are very black and white,” he says. “Aquaman is especially cool because being a Kanaka Maoli—being Hawaiian—our Gods are Kanaloa and Maui, and the Earth is 71 percent water, so I get to represent that. And I’m someone who gets to represent all the islanders, not some blond-haired superhero. It’s cool that there’s a brown-skinned superhero.”

The irony of playing Aquaman isn’t lost on Momoa. Fifteen years ago, after a brief modeling stint—including being named Hawaii’s Model of the Year 1999—he was cast in his first major acting role: as Jason Ioane, a hunky lifeguard on the spin-off series Baywatch Hawaii.

When I bring up the coincidence, he laughs. “It’s a trip,” Momoa says. “I spent 15 years trying to dig myself out of the Baywatch hole, and now I’m Aquaman. Life is very good.”

Source: The Daily Beast