Apparently now that Warner Bros. has unveiled the release dates for its DC movie slate, the stars can start talking about the films – to a degree.  Just yesterday we shared some quotes from Jason Momoa on Aquaman and now we’ve got Ray Fisher talking Cyborg, too.

The guy doesn’t have a single feature film credit to his name, but soon enough, he’ll have two pretty big ones – Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League Part One.  On top of that, much to Fisher’s surprise, he’s getting a Cyborg standalone movie, too.  Hit the jump to find out which Justice League members Fisher has met and what it was like to first find he’s getting a solo movie mere hours before the Warner Bros./DC release date announcement hit.

ray-fisher-fetch-clay-make-man

Even though Fisher was a total unknown in the film realm prior to his casting, he has been working his way up in the theater industry.  In fact, he gained almost 20 pounds of muscle to play Muhammad Ali in the off-Broadway play Fetch Clay, Make Man last year.  While working on that, Ang Lee came to see the show.  Fisher told EW:

“One of his next projects is a 3-D boxing movie about Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali.  So he’s scouting for people to play Ali in this film.  Ang and I meet to talk about his ideas for the project and it’s all very interesting.  Waiting to see where everything goes with that.”

That’s where it all started.  After Lee’s visit, Fisher got loads of interest from managers, agents and casting executives eager to see him in the show.  Apparently at one point Fisher was a “serious contender” for a role in Star Wars: Episode VII, but ultimately he went with the half man, half machine Victor Stone instead.  Here’s what Fisher had to say about snagging the role:

“I’m a long-game player and didn’t see any of this happening until at least my 40s.  It’s a huge honor, but a bit of pressure comes along with it.  My mind is just boggled right now.”

Turns out, there’s going to be more pressure than Fisher initially expected:

“I didn’t know the extent to which DC and WB had planned on taking my character.  When I signed on, I just wanted to be part of this world.  But that specific information, I found out then and there.  I didn’t think I’d be getting my own stand-alone film.”

As EW points out, that makes Fisher the first African-American to get his very own superhero film since Will Smith starred in Hancock back in 2008.

Fisher wrapped his work on Batman v Superman in July and even though he wouldn’t say anything about how Cyborg factors into that narrative, he did note that he got to meet Momoa, Gal Gadot, Ben Affleck and Jesse Eisenberg.  He also added:

“I met everyone in the Justice League except Henry Cavill and Ezra Miller.  It was surreal.  You get this idea of going to work on a Hollywood set as being really stressful and nerve-wracking.  But it blew that stereotype away.  If they did have stressful times, it wasn’t while I was there.”

Hopefully good vibes lead to a good movie.  Fisher certainly seems to think so:

“Let me tell you, man, people are in for a hell of a treat.”

cyborg-movie