The Accountant 2 Star Cynthia Addai-Robinson on Finally Working With Ben Affleck & Jon Bernthal

The Accountant 2 star Cynthia Addai-Robinson sat down with The Direct's Russ Milheim, where she opened up about returning nine years later for the sequel, and finally working alongside Ben Affleck and Jon Bernthal.

The original 2016 movie was beloved by many, which eventually led to its new sequel being created nine years later.

This new adventure finds Robinson's Marybeth Medina teaming up with Affleck's Christian Wolff and Bernthal's Braxton to help unravel a dangerous conspiracy.

Cynthia Addai-Robinson on Teaming Up With Ben Affleck and Jon Bernthal

"I'm Calling Us an Odd Throuple..."

• The Direct: "The big thing this time around is, not only does Medina get to come across Wolff again, but she gets to team up with him instead of hunting down. How did that change the dynamics at play with these characters?"

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: Well, I love that in the first movie, both for the characters, but also for myself as an actor, I never got to work with Ben in the first movie, I pursued him. I stared at the photo a bunch of times. I saw him once on the first day and again on the last day.

So, what's really great is there is an actual, Oh, like, here you are in the flesh. You know, this sort of mythological character of Christian Wolff, and now we're going to work together. And now I'm going to sort of see up close how you operate.

Because it's one thing to sort of study a person and understand them on a page, and it's entirely something else to have first-hand experience with them. So I love that I too, had the moment of, oh, I'm going to get to work with Ben. I'm going to get to work with Jon.

I have not worked with them. I don't know what the process is going to be like. And it turned out that it served the characters really well, because they're all in real time, trying to kind of circle each other, understand each other. And, you know, I'm calling us an odd throuple, three of us.

• The Direct: "It's a risky choice. I think, for someone who, you're hunting Wolff, and he's kind of this big bad guy in some ways. What does Medina envision to be the worst case scenario when she initiates this, and she's seeing how this might play out, how badly could it go? And what is that risk that she's taking?"

Addai-Robinson: I think her worst-case scenario is that she gets dragged down into the gutter where he operates. And I think the driving force for her and her life is both justice, but again, using all the tools of the law to put the bad guys away.

And that line can move, right.? And so it's already moved in terms of her getting these sort of tips to be able to solve big, big cases at the Treasury Department. But where does the line become too far.

So, I think it's a real test for her, and at a certain point it's also like, I could just do this by myself guys. Like, we are not the same, even though we're trying to do the same thing.

So, I think that that's really our journey, you know, over the course of the movie. So you're going to see from beginning to end where she kind of lands on that question of, you know, justice and what's the best way to get it.

Cynthia Addai-Robinson on Jon Bernthal's Braxton in The Accountant 2

"It's Like Watching a Ping Pong Match..."

• The Direct: "We mentioned Jon Bernthal's Braxton, who gets to join the party with you and Ben. Can you talk more about how awesome it was to work alongside both Ben and Jon? And what were some of those scenes that you got to be a part of with them, that you were like, Man,I didn't think that I would get to do this?"

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: I mean, it's sort of having essentially the best front row seat to a performance and then somehow finding yourself in the middle of it, because it's like watching a ping pong match as these two brothers and these two actors sort of lob the ball back and forth.

And they both have very different styles, which suit the character. And so, you know, Jon would sort of throw out these sort of improvised lines, and Ben's reacting real time, and I'm just literally trying to make heads or tails of it and also say, You know what, I can't again, I don't want to be sort of dragged down to your level as characters.

So, it was a lot of fun. And I felt like when you're trying to raise your own game as an actor, you want to be working alongside peers that you feel like are operating at a high level. So, I was just really excited that it's like these guys who admire as actors and creatives, I'm going to get to sort of join them and join the party.

• The Direct: "On a character level, how does Medina see Braxton compared to Wolff?

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: Oh, I think she sees Braxton as a much more extreme and worse option. I think for her, that sense of unpredictability, when you don't know what a person is about to do, I think that for her is, she no longer feels a sense of control over a situation.

And I think for her, she wants to sort of oversee and control and guide the plan, so anybody that's throwing a monkey wrench into it, and sort of like throwing her off her game. She already is, like, I could just put you away.

I could make one phone call, and we could end this. So she's really sort of having to look to Christian to kind of gage, are we really doing this? Am I really sort of going along with this based on your advice, in a sense?

So yeah, I mean, I think in some ways, they're really on polar opposites of the law, but maybe in an alternate universe and in another life, maybe they'd be grabbing a beer together. Who knows?

• The Direct: "Does Medina have any chaotic siblings on her own?

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: We established in the first movie that she has a sister, and basically, when they were young, the reason why she kind of ended up in the system, like in juvenile detention, was that she basically beat up on people who were about influence.

And so I think there's a sense of being a protector. And again, that early fork in the road, moment where there's maybe a version of Mary Beth Medina, where she could have gotten into the system, become a criminal herself, but she sort of took a different path.

And so I think she would have a very different relationship with her sibling. But I love that for people who do have siblings or people in their life who are like siblings, it's a complicated relationship, right? I think [with] this movie, that's the most accessible thing.

I think for audiences, just that sense of, you know, your sibling can be like your best friend, and also the person you have like the biggest fights with, and everything in between. So I think that really resonates, I think, with a lot of people.

Returning as Marybeth Medina After Nine Years for The Accountant 2

Returning Was Almost Like A High School Reunion

• The Direct: "It's been nine years since that first movie on a personal level, and as a performer, how different of a place were you in coming into this movie compared to the first one?"

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: I mean as different as anybody—When you think back to where you were nine years ago, what you were doing, what your life looked like, but in a really lovely way, as I've been preparing for the premiere tonight (on 4/16/2025), because we're having our big sort of red carpet moment this evening, I was thinking back to the first premiere, and that being really my first, like proper red carpet, my first big studio movie. And it was thrilling. It was exciting.

It felt like, literally a dream come true in terms of whatever I had envisioned when I thought about what it would be like to be an actor in Hollywood. And I sort of had that moment all those years ago.

And so it's really interesting to take stock of it now and feel like a much more sort of centered, confident version of myself, which feels very apropos for Marybeth Medina, or where the character is nine years ago to where she is now. So there's a nice sort of parallel going on for myself and the character.

• The Direct: "It must have felt kind of like a high school reunion in a lot of ways, because a lot of the people are from the first movie, and then being able to just reunite after so long."

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: Yeah, definitely. I mean, obviously, you see the people that are in front of the camera, the actors who are returning, but there are so many people involved behind the scenes. Obviously, both our writer, Bill Dubuque, and director, Gavin O'Connor, our producer Lynette Howell, and our camera ops.

You know, when I walked in on the first day, it was sort of seeing all these familiar faces. And we also got to film in Los Angeles, which we [filmed] the first movie in Atlanta. So it was just a really lovely sense of, okay, there's something familiar here that I can latch on to that gives me comfort, but they're also all these wonderful new people that we're bringing into the fold...

I think that we have come up with something that is going to satisfy long time fans of the first movie and give them something new to hopefully watch on repeat as as I know a lot of people do with with the first movie.

• The Direct: "When audiences first see Medina in this second film, where is she mentally and just professionally, where does she start this journey at?"

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: So, she's sort of like the new Ray King, in a sense, you know, we see at the end of the first movie that he's sort of passing the proverbial baton, so to speak. And we are taking the time jump in the movie as well.

So, we've got this eight-year sort of time jump, and we see her in this elevated position at the Treasury Department. But along with that promotion, there's also the feeling of impostor syndrome and a bit of, could I have done this on my own merit, would I be here if I'd sort of taken the traditional path?

So, there's that sort of slight discomfort, but before you know it, she's set on this journey, and she is going to get to come face to face with the man that she was pursuing all those years ago, which is The Accountant.

• The Direct: "Has the thought of Wolff kind of getting away been a heavy burden to her over these years?"

Cynthia Addai-Robinson: I mean I don't know if it's so much a burden, but I think there's more the burden of the discomfort of somebody who is very much about the rule of law and being on the right side of the law to serve justice, and all of the kind of complications when you know that you're bending the rules for the greater good, for her justification.

But really, I think when she comes face-to-face with him, it is that clash of, I follow the rules, you're clearly a rule breaker. But we're also both wanting the same thing, and we're both trying to sort of solve this puzzle.

So, a lot of the discomfort comes from this clash. But also in the sequel, a lot of humor comes from the fact that these two just are just not quite the right fit. And I love that this movie is actually hilarious, like it's really funny, and I think that's going to be a pleasant surprise for audiences.

The full interview can be viewed here:

The Accountant 2 hits theaters on April 25, 2025.

Be sure to check out some of The Direct's previous interview with Cynthia Addai-Robinson about The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.