Still, as Abbott told New York magazine, his first taste of X-Men fame was “a nightmare,” as his appearance at the Disney event introducing the cast of the rebooted X-Men team found the Wolf Man actor greeted with an ego-deflating lack of enthusiasm. “I almost did a fist pump when I walked out, and then I felt like the applause was muted,” said the actor. “So I was like, ‘I’m just going to walk out and nod.'” Summing up his first public exposure as the all-powerful mutant telepath, Abbott stated, “It feels almost like a video game, or a dream. Not like a good dream. It’s a bit of both—a bit of a dream and a nightmare.”
In the end, Abbott, who appeared onstage at the event alongside Obsession‘s Inde Navarrette (playing Rogue), Broadway actor Maya Boyd (Storm) and Abbott’s former Girls co-star Adam Driver (X-Men big bad Mr. Sinister) to wow fans eager for Marvel’s premiere mutant team to make their rebooted MCU debut, could only smile and wave. (Other actors already confirmed include Sadie Sink as Jean Grey, Kit Connor as Cyclops and Samara Weaving as Emma Frost.)
Still, there’s always the hope that fans will eventually accept the veteran indie film actor as a worthy successor to Patrick Stewart’s indelible Professor X and James McAvoy’s younger Xavier. “I think I started walking out pretty enthusiastically, and then I kind of felt like a lot of people there didn’t know who I was,” says a chastened Abbott, who’s currently starring in Netflix’s highly-anticipated East Of Eden alongside fellow MCU mainstay Florence Pugh. “So then my energy shifted within the split second,” Abbott concluded. “I was a little bit more humble about it.”
The as-yet untitled X-Men reboot will be directed by Jake Schreier and has a release date of May 5, 2028.
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