In one of Hollywood’s most famous “what if?” scenarios of the modern superhero movie era, Oscar winner Nicolas Cage was once cast to play Superman in Tim Burton’s abandoned late ’90s Superman Lives project. The film was abruptly pulled from production with little explanation.
The actor (and huge Superman fan) has since voiced The Last Son of Krypton in the animated Teen Titans Go! to the Movies, and has even talked publicly about some of the comic book villains he would want to play, including DC Comics’ Joker and Marvel’s Doctor Doom. Now we can add another iconic bad guy to that list.
In a recent interview to promote his new horror film, Mandy, the subject of revisiting the world of Superman came up. “Oh, I think my Superman days are long gone,” he said of a fan campaign to make him the next Kal-El, in light of Henry Cavill’s exit from the DC franchise at Warner Brothers.
When asked about the possibility of playing a villain like Lex Luthor instead, he was all for it. “Oh, that would be great!” he exclaimed. “I’d make a great Lex Luthor.”
Cage is no stranger to playing the bad guy on screen. Castor Troy, his character in the cinematic classic Face/Off, remains one of the best villains of the past few decades. That said, there are plenty of different DC villains that Cage could portray and we’re all crossing our fingers in the hopes that one day he will eventually be cast as one of them.
