Ruaridh Mollica on VisionQuest: 'I Feel So Seen' in the MCU

Ruaridh Mollica makes his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in "VisionQuest," now streaming on Disney+, as Tommy Shepherd — the superhero Speed — and he says playing a bisexual character as a bisexual actor is "such an honor." The 26-year-old Scot told Variety: "I feel so seen."

The casting was one of the fastest leaps from arthouse to superhero franchise in recent memory. Mollica broke out at Sundance in Mikka Mäkelä's 2024 drama "Sebastian," playing an aspiring London writer moonlighting as a male escort, and earned a British Independent Film Award nomination for breakout performance. By that ceremony, "VisionQuest" was already his.

The secret leaked early, and charmingly. Stage-door waiters at London's Trafalgar Theatre, where Mollica made his West End debut in "Clarkston," saw him in a "VisionQuest" hat beside co-star Joe Locke in an "Agatha All Along" cap. "It had been a little secret that we had to keep together on stage… so this was just some clues and hints!" Mollica said, speaking at London's Raffles Hotel the morning before the U.K. premiere.

Locke, of course, plays Billy Kaplan in "Agatha All Along" — Billy Maximoff reborn, son of Wanda Maximoff and Vision. Mollica now plays his older twin, introduced midway through episode one as a teenage grifter on London's streets.

What shaped the performance?

Mollica's reference point was unexpected: Matt Damon in "Good Will Hunting." "He's an orphan. He not got anyone. He's had to build who he is by himself, and there's a loneliness to that, and a yearning for family," he said. Damon, in his view, built "the archetype of a lot of male characters."

There was also the backstory. At the end of "Agatha All Along," Shepherd — having drowned — receives Tommy Maximoff's consciousness via Locke's Billy. "And suddenly, my character has visions of a family, but it's a father who's a robot and a mother who's a witch… and they're the Avengers… and there's fucking lasers and guns and explosions!" Mollica said.

On Tommy's bisexuality, which isn't shown through attraction to men in the show, Mollica pushed back against any disappointment. Tommy flirts with Lisa Molinari. "But I think that's makes me feel more seen as bisexual," he said. "It's not necessarily about who you're dating, it's about who you are inside." He and Locke now form, as he puts it, "queer twin brothers in the MCU together … it's so cool."

Ironically, Mollica had just spoofed the industry in HBO's "The Franchise," playing a frazzled PA on a doomed superhero set. "So when I saw the Marvel logo I thought, oh, well, I'm never going to get that … because I've just taken the piss out of them!" Within months he was screen-testing in New York with Paul Bettany and showrunner Terry Matalas.

Why does the accent matter?

Bettany settled the accent question mid-audition: "Terry, what do we think about his own accent?" Mollica's reaction: "Really? A Marvel superhero can be Scottish?" He isn't the first — Richard Madden played Ikaris in "Eternals" — but he's proud. He cites Ewan McGregor, who stays "Scottish, even in his American roles," with mock envy.

The Scottishness is holding. This year he shot "Bare," Lorna Tucker's memoir adaptation with "Bridgerton" breakout Florence Hunt, then rode a motorcycle with Channing Tatum in the Brad Pitt-produced "Isle of Man." This week came "Laird," the Paramount+ Highlands saga led by Kenneth Branagh, in which Mollica — currently with dyed ginger hair, as production is underway — plays Branagh's son.

"I went Paul Bettany being my dad to Ken Branagh being my dad," he said. "How is that possible?" If the trajectory holds, an American accent will eventually beckon. "I can't do one!" he whispered, then reconsidered: "for any casting director out there… I can do one!"