Moon Knight exec: Lack of MCU cameos was a "plus" that made the series "richer"

The Hollywood Reporter

Moon Knight creator Jeremy Slater recently revealed that the show scrapped a crossover featuring The Eternals' Kumail Nanjiani. "I tried very hard to get the Eternals into the show, just because I’m buddies with Kumail Nanjiani… I (wanted) some Kingo," says Slater in an interview with The Direct, adding that re-creating Egypt proved to be too expensive. But Moon Knight executive producer Grant Curtis tells The Hollywood Reporter that a lack of Marvel Cinematic Universe cameos benefitted the series. "Well, if you look closely, there are some connective threads," says Curtis, adding: "This universe was built upon character first, and these are all character explorations first and foremost. And once we got in the writers’ room with Jeremy, and we started mapping this out with the other incredible writers, we realized that to give Marc Spector, Steven Grant and Jake Lockley the best, most engaging journey, all of those other connectivity points that we thought we needed and wanted started to fade away. And once you throw in Arthur Harrow, played by the great Ethan Hawke, and the previously mentioned Layla El-Faouly, played by May (Calamawy), we realized that the other connectivity points were not necessary. So if you hadn’t seen any other Marvel Cinematic Universe offering and this was your first deep dive, it’s actually pretty groovy to be telling a story where you’re just as emotionally invested from frame one as the person who has seen everything else because there is that lack of 100 percent connectivity. Although we didn’t plan it from the beginning, it ended up being a plus that makes the journey of Moon Knight that much richer."