If it’s not abundantly clear already, there’s some major drama going on with the recasting of The Hulk for Marvel Films’ “The Avengers” picture. On Friday, news broke that Edward Norton would not reprising his role of Bruce Banner in the film despite director Joss Whedon meeting with the actor and apparently being on the same creative page.
Marvel had their side of the story which painted Norton as not being a team player (Norton did an uncredited rewrite on the script the Louis Leterrier directed, “The Incredible Hulk” and then got into a very public spat with Marvel in March of 2008 where he was essentially locked out of the editing room).
Obviously Norton’s agent takes major umbrage with Marvel head Kevin Feige’s statements about Norton and said they were “mean spirited, accusatory comments.”
Well, even if that war of words continues, Marvel has clearly moved on. And the next man to possibly take the role? CHUD says that Joaquin Phoenix has been offered the role. It’s just an offer and Phoenix is apparently mulling over the options, because it’s not just one “Avengers” film he’d be locked into and Marvel is eying up rebooting the ‘Hulk’ franchise for a third time (Eric Bana played Banner in Ang Lee’s 2005 film, “Hulk”).
Is this the picture Phoenix wants to step back into Hollywood with, after having gone seemingly crazy with a hip-hop career that will be captured in Casey Affleck’s upcoming documentary, “I’m Still Here: The Lost Year of Joaquin Phoenix“? We’re not sure if this is something Phoenix will actually want to do, especially considering the actor had retired from acting and went out on an indie picture like “Two Lovers.” This doesn’t strike us as his kind of film and we wouldn’t be surprised if he passed, but it’s not a bad choice and he does look the part. But in a film like “The Avengers” or even a ‘Hulk’ movie, the person that portrays Bruce Banner doesn’t exactly have to do a lot of acting. One would assume that in “The Avengers” — which will also already feature Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Jeremy Renner, Scarlett Johansson, Samuel L. Jackson, Don Cheadle and probably many more — the opportunities to do some real acting will be even less.
The irony of course is that Norton’s been labelled as an actor who is difficult to work with, but would Phoenix, who’s reputation has been pretty nutty in the last few years, be any easier? If the offer is true, it probably goes to show that Marvel just really doesn’t want to work with Norton no matter what.
