Singer on Superman
San Francisco Chronicle
INDUSTRY BUZZ
Hugh Hart
Sunday, November 21, 2004
Hardly anyone knew who Hugh Jackman was five years ago when director Bryan Singer cast him as Wolverine in "X-Men." Now Singer's ready to make a household name out of Brandon Routh. The 25-year-old actor from Iowa, whose onscreen credits are limited to "One Life to Live" and MTV's "Undressed" series, was handpicked by Singer to star in Warner Bros.' new Superman movie after the two met in a Sunset Boulevard coffee shop.
"I saw his potential on tape, but for me it's always the meeting," Singer told me three days before taking off for Australia to begin preproduction on the film. "I sat with him at the Coffee Bean and we talked for a couple of hours. So little of it is quantifiable. I just went with my gut.
"When you're casting a film of this size, you've got to look at three things. First, talent. Second, does he look like the guy and have the physical presence -- if Brandon walked into your office, you'd step back and say, 'Oh my God, it's Superman.' And third, you have to find a personality who can contend with all the rigors involved in making a show you're going to shoot for five months, with a lot of stunts and visual effects. That's a lot of work. A lot of work. Brandon had all three qualities."
Singer's search for Superman began about three months ago. Until then, he'd been on track to make his third "X-Men" movie for Fox. When he heard from Warner Bros. executive Jeff Rubinoff that his studio's Superman deal with director McG (Joseph "McG" Nichol) was about to crumble, Singer moved quickly. While attending a friend's wedding in Hawaii on the Fourth of July, he says, "my writers and I hammered out an outline over the weekend for this story I'd had in mind for years, and I came back and pitched it to (Warner Bros. president) Alan Horn and Jeff."
Warner bought the concept -- Superman returns to a hostile homecoming in Metropolis after a long absence -- and Singer dropped out of "X-Men 3." Fox executives were not amused, and Singer's production office on the Fox lot was unceremoniously shut down.
"As hard as it was to part ways, there are only so many years you can put into something," Singer says. "I spent six years of my life on 'X Men.' I delivered them a franchise, and I delivered them a billion dollars, and I worked quite intensely to do that. So for all the feathers it ruffled, at some point I think everyone will realize we had a really good experience and they have the potential to go on, with or without me. At the moment, without me."
