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One of the little running press currents in the lead-up to next week’s release of James Gunn’s Superman has been the fact that both David Corwenswet (Superman) and Nicholas Hoult (Lex Luthor) auditioned for the title part, and only one of them got it. (Savvy readers may, after a second reading of the previous sentence, work out which one came out on top.) It’s a lovely little bit of narrative sauce for the film: All-too-human multi-billionaire Lex Luthor, in many of his incarnations, is implied, or outright stated, to be driven by his deep jealousy of the Man Of Steel; having Corenswet beat Hoult before they’d even shot a frame of the movie can’t help but play into the narrative.
Now, though, director James Gunn has happily weighed in on the two’s auditions, and explained exactly why he picked Corenswet instead of Hoult. (This is one of the nice things about Gunn functionally being his own boss in his DC Studios gig; his natural inclinations to talk frankly about movie-making can get a full and only lightly-filtered workout.) Gunn was talking to Jake’s Takes this week (as part of the same junket that produced info that test screenings nixed a moment when the film’s baddies punched Superman’s dog), when he was asked to talk about various actors’ Superman auditions. Gunn stated that he didn’t think his choices ultimately came down to who’s the better actor—noting, with odd candor, that “[Hoult]’s a great actor; some may say he’s better than David in certain ways”—but that he didn’t fit Gunn’s mental conception of the character.
“He’s more controlled,” Gunn said of Hoult’s style, contrasting him with the more “loose” Corenswet. Interestingly, it also came down to the Loises: Hoult apparently tested well with an actress who had a less restrained style for the character of Clark Kent’s love interest/professional rival, while Corenswet played well off the more (again) “controlled” Rachel Brosnahan. (Which is sort of an interesting way to think about the characters as Supes’ two oddly similar primary foils.)
Oh, also, Gunn was, once again, forced to weigh in on the conversation about whether Superman should wear trunks or not; when asked why people obsess over this particular comic book costuming detail, Gunn was humorously blunt: “Because people are foolish.”
