Olivia Munn chose kicking ass in X-Men: Apocalypse over taking names in Deadpool
American Airlines, of all places, is offering some insight into how Olivia Munn chooses her film roles. During an interview with the airline’s in-flight magazine, American Way, Munn reveals she was offered the option to play either Ryan Reynold’s girlfriend in Deadpool or Psylocke in X-Men: Apocalypse. She went with the latter role because it gave her the chance to kick ass.
The article is light on direct quotes, but the interviewer writes: “Munn says she didn’t want to be the girlfriend. Not again. She wanted to fight. To make noise. To kick butt.” When offering her the X-Men role, the filmmakers informed Munn that her character wouldn’t get a lot of dialogue but would have “an important presence” in the movie. Munn seems to have been A-okay with that, revealing she immediately asked whether she would get a fight scene. As Munn puts it, “The fight scene could be her monologue.”
It’s actually kind of hard to track the flow of the conversation through the writer’s descriptions of Munn’s smiles, dramatic pauses, and the way they nibble mango slices while chatting in a “glamorous suite” with “a perfectly blue Los Angeles sky visible beyond the picture windows.” But the ability to play a powerful character seems to have been a sticking point throughout negotiations with Fox. In describing her early conversations with the X-Men filmmakers, Munn explains:
I thought Psylocke was always one of the most lethal characters, and I said, ‘Yes, as long as you’re not using her to be the eye candy. She has really powerful abilities.’ And they said, ‘Yes, that’s an important part.’