This week it has been one step forward, one step backward for the casting of Matt Reeves’s The Batman.
While on Monday it was announced that Zoe Kravitz would be playing Selena Kyle, aka Catwoman, in the upcoming comic book adaptation, news now comes that negotiations with Jonah Hill, who was in talks to appear in the film as an unnamed villain, have fallen apart. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the actor and Warner Brothers, the studio making the film, “could not come to terms on a deal.”
Word is that Hill was originally approached to play the Penguin, but countered with a desire to play The Riddler. Reeves’s film is rumored to feature a number of Batman’s iconic Rogue’s Gallery in a story that draws inspiration from the graphic novel The Long Halloween by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale.
In addition to Kravitz, the film will star Robert Pattinson as Bruce Wayne/Batman and Jeffrey Wright as Gotham City Police Commissioner James Gordon.
Warner has high hopes for the film. The studio is reportedly hoping that Reeves’ cinematic reboot of the character will be the first of a trilogy of Batman films and will also launch a number of spinoff features centering on other heroes in the Batman mythos including Batgirl and Nightwing.
The Batman is scheduled for release on June 25, 2021.
