James McAvoy: “You never say never [to Professor X].”
In a recent interview with Collider, James McAvoy, who played the role of Professor Charles Xavier (A.K.A. Professor X) in many X-Men movies, confirmed that he would be willing to return to the role for the Marvel Cinematic Universe!
A History of Charles
Charles Xavier was first played on the big screen by Captain Picard (another character McAvoy wouldn’t rule out playing) himself, Sir Patrick Stewart, in the original X-Men trilogy, the first of which was released in 2000.
Photo: NY Daily News
McAvoy first joined the cast in 2011, with X-Men: First Class.
In that movie, which was set during the 1960s instead of during the present day, we “flashed-back” to a younger version of Charles…. He even had hair (at least at the beginning of the story, anyway).
Photo: 20th Century Fox
McAvoy went on to appear in multiple X-Men and X-Men-related movies (even making a brief cameo appearance in 2018’s Deadpool 2).
And in 2014’s X-Men: Days of Future Past, both Stewart and McAvoy appeared in the role of Xavier (just at different points in the character’s timeline).
Photo: 20th Century Fox
But with the 2017 acquisition of 20th Century Fox by The Walt Disney Company, the rights to the X-Men returned to Marvel Studios, and speculation about what actor might play Xavier when the character inevitably enters the MCU immediately arose.
Make Mine McAvoy?
Neil Gaiman‘s groundbreaking graphic novel series The Sandman is currently the source material for a new Audible adaptation that is both fully accessible and fully faithful to the source material. And McAvoy, who plays Dream for the Audible drama, has recently been doing the interview circuits.
James McAvoy. Photo: Irish Times
In the recent interview with Collider about his new audiodrama, McAvoy (kinda) confirmed that he would indeed be willing to return to the role of Xavier… in fact, here’s how the actor responded when the interviewer asked him about his future as Professor X:
I feel like, yeah. I feel like I got to explore, not everything I wanted to explore, because there’s always more, surely, but I got to explore a ton of Professor X, and I feel quite satisfied with what I got out of him as a performer. It’s not to say that you don’t ever want to, you never want to come back, and you never want to do it again, and all that kind of stuff. You never say never, as I believe James Bond once said. But I’m not chomping at the bit. I’m not going to be gutted and desperately sad if it never happens again.
Let me break that down for you, Marvel Blog True Believers: in the interview, he also made it very clear that he could live with another actor being cast in the role instead because he’s creatively satisfied with the time he spent with the character.
Photo: 20th Century Fox
While I can see either possibility coming to pass, I’ve got an alternate pitch: cast a new actor for Xaiver, but keep both of the old ones, and bring on Ultimate Professor X.
R.E.S.P.E.C.T Ultimate Professor X. Photo: Marvel Comics
Enter the Charles-Verse!
What do you think, Marvel Blog True Believers? Is three Xaviers two too many, or still a couple short? We’re waiting to hear from you! Let us know what you think in the comment section.
Source: Screenrant/Collider
