Nic Cage Doesn’t Need To Be In The MCU, But He Still Wishes He & Tim Burton Made ‘Superman Lives’

Actor, wild man, and comic book nerd Nicolas Cage was at the Miami Film Festival this week to accept Variety’s Legend & Groundbreaker Award. And EW reports that the actor opened up about the current state of superhero movies. In short, Cage doesn’t need to be in the MCU, and he still regrets he didn’t get to make “Superman Lives” with Tim Burton.

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“I’ve gotta be nice about Marvel movies, because I named myself after a Stan Lee character named Luke Cage” Cage said at the festival. “What am I going to do, put Marvel movies down? Stan Lee is my surrealistic father. He named me.” As Cage continued, he said he understood the “frustration” some moviegoers have with superhero movies but recognizes that “there’s plenty of room for everybody.” As for whether, he’ll ever be in an MCU movie, the actor responded, “I don’t need to be in the MCU, I’m Nic Cage.” Indeed you are, sir, and never change.

Cage has brushed shoulders with Marvel fare before, with 2007’s “Ghost Rider” and its 2011 sequel, “Spirit Of Vengeance.” But that was before the MCU became the industry juggernaut it currently is. And after Keanu Reeves recently spoke about his interest in taking over the Johnny Blaze/Ghost Ride role in a future MCU project (which Kevin Feige sounds game on), don’t expect Cage to reprise instead. Besides, Cage pines for another superhero role anyway: his “emo Superman” from Tim Burton’s unmade “Superman Lives.”

Cage opened up about the doomed project at the festival and claims that he initially brought Burton onto the film. The studio wanted journeyman director Renny Harlin to helm the feature, but Cage had Burton in mind instead. “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,” Cage said. “I loved what he did with Michael [Keaton] and “Batman,” and I was a big fan.”

But Warner Bros. was cagey (no pun intended) about bringing Burton on board after the financial disaster of 1996’s “Mars Attacks!“. And that’s not the only reason Cage said Warner Bros. got “cold feet” about “Superman Lives”: Cage’s vision for the film was decidedly non-traditional. “It was more of a 1980s Superman with like, the samurai black long hair” Cage said about his take on Clark Kent. “I thought it was gonna be a really different, sort of emo Superman, but we never got there.” Check out the video below for a glimpse at Cage’s Superman costume.

Ultimately, Warner Bros. canned the project. “They’d spent a lot of money already building the sets and the costume and what have you. But you never know,” Cage explained. I don’t mean to be cryptic Cage, but you never know!” But Cage has talked about “Superman Lives” before, and from the sounds of things, Warner Bros. never really had a clear vision for the movie. In a 1999 interview with Howard Stern, Burton said, “We were looking at the suit and the studio and the producer were afraid of the red underwear. They wanted to have him in like Michael Jordan shorts.” Burton added that Warner Bros. wanted to put the Man of Steel in corduroy, a very puzzling preference.

It’s a shame that “Superman Lives” never got made, but let’s face it: Nic Cage isn’t an actor that fits the mold of a superhero movie, especially the ones being made now. The Cageian presence burns too bright for that kind of fare, and that’s why fans love the actor so much.