Supposedly, in some of the early conceptual work for Kingpin he was conceived as a black man, but Marvel was concerned about negative stereotypes and went for a white version.
As also noted, his attire was also intended to avoid some stereotyping as well.
Thus, casting Michael Clark Duncan as Kingpin was, in a sense, in line with a very, very early image of Kingpin (pre-publication, in fact).
Here’s my take on the OP: is race/ethnicity central to the character or not?
As Kingpin is a master criminal in a huge multi-racial city I don’t think his race/ethnicity is central to the character. What’s important is that he’s a big, imposing, massive guy, not just tall but wide in a way that tells you there is a lot of muscle underneath. His ethnicity doesn’t really matter.
For Nick Fury, a black WWII era Nick Fury doesn’t seem as plausible to me due to the social bias against black men during that time, but a modern black Fury works just fine for me. As noted, what’s most important about that character is that he’s a bad-ass. Samuel L. Jackson does just fine in that role, which is why Marvel used him in Ultimate Nick Fury and in the movies.
The new Battlestar Galactica mixed up the ethinicity/gender of a number of characters and it worked pretty well - the most important features of Starbuck was that Starbuck was the best damn pilot in the fleet and a rule-breaking maverick, not that Starbuck was a man or woman. Boomer went from a black man to an Asian woman. Colonel Tigh went from a black man to a white man. Adama went from clearly European to a Mexican. All that switching around seems to have worked out just fine.
A black James West in Wild, Wild West didn’t work for me because there’s no way in hell a black man would have been that effective in that role in that time period. Also, the movie sucked (not the actors - I like the actors, but I think the movie they were in sucked).
A black Heimdall in Thor did make me pause, but then, the Asgardians in Marvel are aliens capable of interstellar travel, not Scandinavians, and the royal family adopted a blue skinned infant of another species (and why is no one upset at the “white-washing” of Loki? Shouldn’t he be able to show his true colors?). In that context it’s not so whacky and Idris Elba convinced me that his Heimdall fit in that context. Maybe Heimdall’s back story would explain it: alien ancestry, Asgard does have racial minorities, the Bifrost gives off radiation that darkens the skin and he’s been exposed to a lot of it, whatever.
Likewise, a non-white James Bond in a *modern *context could work well - the British Empire was world-wide and there are people of all ancestries with British citizenship these days even if England is still predominantly white. It would also confirm the “explanation” for Bond being around so damn long as “James Bond” being a code name, like 007, that’s been held by several different men. (Or maybe he’s a Time Lord, which would also account for his longevity and changing face.)
As someone else pointed out, Othello doesn’t have to be black, he just needs to be of a different race than the rest of the cast to get the point across.
Now, Sue and Johnny Storm in the Fantastic Four don’t have to be white… but I do think they should be of the same race/ethnicity because they are brother and sister. The split race thing does bother me.
So, again, it depends on whether a race or ethnicity is an important part of a character. And it does help if blood relatives somewhat look like they could be related. I was pleased that Marvel cast a half-Chinese/half-Causaian woman to play a character who is the daughter of a Caucasian father and Chinese mother in Agents of Shield.