Tim Blake Nelson wrote a novel about superhero actors

Earlier this year, Tim Blake Nelson took over the role of Samuel Sterns for Captain America: Brave New World. Far from its first entry the world of superheroesand now that he has some good experience under his belt, he has produced a novel inspired by this mandate.

Simply titled Superheroes, The book focuses on Peter Compton, a washed-up actor who seeks to make a career comeback by starring in the fictional film “Major Machina.” Shortly after he landed in Atlanta to begin filming, things began to deteriorate due to “tension and ego,” as well as Compton’s own on-set behavior making the rounds online. After that, it’s not just the film that could fall apart, but also his relationship with his producing partner and longtime wife, Marci Levy.

The parallels write themselves, which Nelson did not hesitate to do. He said the hollywood reporter that the book is quite specific “about the world I experienced as an actor and filmmaker. […] Everything in this book I either experienced or heard about from someone who experienced it firsthand. So I don’t consider the world I’m describing to be wildly exaggerated. He was already writing the book when he was asked to come back to Captain America, and during production, he spoke with as many people on set as possible — from his fellow actors to Marvel producer Nate Moore and cinematographer — to “reinforce the accuracy” of what he was putting on the page.

But if you think Superheroes frequently takes photos of this part of the film industry at the The Workshop, Nelson emphasized that this was not the case. Rather, he thinks it’s more of a “love letter to filmmaking” and a “microcosm of landmark filmmaking as a way to look more broadly at our culture as it currently finds itself.” In fact, he thinks the genre is still doing quite well, even if it’s not as money-making as it once was, and hopes readers will understand that he wrote this with real intention and not just to stroke his own ego.

“I don’t take writing novels lightly, which is why I waited until I was fifty to write my first,” he said. THR. “The ambition here is to write a real novel.” Fortunately, Superheroes is in stores now, so you can find out for yourself just how much of a “real novel” it is.

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