Nicolas Cage has done pretty much everything on screen, including playing a superhero.
On the Marvel side he played Ghost Rider for two films, and more recently voiced Spider-Man Noir for the animated masterpiece “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse”.
On the DC side, he voiced Superman in the animated “Teen Titans GO! To the Movies,” and came damn close to playing Superman in live-action form for Tim Burton back in the 1990s.
On Sunday night, Cage appeared at the Miami Film Festival to accept a Legend & Groundbreaker Award from Variety who did a Q&A with him. The trade paper rep and Cage discussed not just the films he made, but the ones he was involved in that didn’t take flight.
That’s when talk turned to the abandoned “Superman Lives” and Cage says that to this day he’s not entirely sure why the project fell apart:
“They wanted Renny Harlin to do the movie. I sat down with Renny. I was doing another picture, he came to the trailer and we talked. I liked Renny… but I thought if I’m going to do this, it’s such a bullseye to hit. I said, this has to be Tim Burton. I called Tim and said, ‘Would you do this?’ Tim didn’t cast me, I cast Tim, and Tim said yes. I loved what he did with Michael [Keaton] and Batman, and I was a big fan.
I love ‘Mars Attacks.’ I thought ‘Mars Attacks’ was just a fantastic, groundbreaking movie. He’s a groundbreaker! But they were scared at the studio because of ‘Mars Attacks.’ Warner Brothers had lost a lot of money on the movie.
These movies that are really weird, that challenge and break ground, they p— a lot of people off. I think they got cold feet. They’d spent a lot of money already building the sets and the costume and what have you. But you never know. I don’t mean to be cryptic Cage, but you never know!
He confirmed his take was “more of a 1980s Superman” with “samurai black long hair… sort of emo Superman.” He was also asked about the state of superhero movies today, their dominance of the box-office and how it impacts everything else. It’s a question he seems quite aware has repercussions online for those who answer it. His response:
“I’ve gotta be nice about Marvel movies, because I named myself after a Stan Lee character named Luke Cage. What am I going to do, put Marvel movies down? Stan Lee is my surrealistic father. He named me. I understand what the frustration is. I get it. But I think there’s plenty of room for everybody. I’m seeing movies like ‘Tar.’ I’m seeing all kinds of artistic and independently driven movies. I think there’s plenty of room for everybody.”
Then asked if he would want to be in the MCU, his response is a quote that is going to be uttered in relation to him for years to come: “I don’t need to be in the MCU, I’m Nic Cage.”
Head over to Variety for the full interview.
