Hugh Jackman has given as much "Wolverine" info as he could give lately, teasing the David Benioff script and announcing the search for a director. Now it’s up to producer Lauren Shuler Donner to make it happen, but she’s got a few other X-ideas on her plate.
"I think we’re going to do Young Magneto," she said. "We have a really great script. We have a director that’s interested and he’ll do a rewrite on the script, but it’s young Magneto and young Xavier. Not kid young but when Magneto got through the holocaust and when Eric Lehnsherr became Magneto."
Ian McKellen as (old) Magneto in "X-Men: The Last Stand."
With the hunt for a Wolverine director, Bryan Singer has expressed interest but is tied up with another superhero franchise. "I would love it. We would love nothing more than to have Bryan do ‘Wolverine’ but Bryan is developing the sequel to ‘Superman’ so I don’t know. It depends on scheduling but nothing would please us more."
Jackman recently told Rotten Tomatoes that they have to wait for each A-list director to review the script and pass before offering it again. "I know, it’s such a pain," Shuler Donner admitted. "It is a pain, sorry. Here’s the problem. Our movie is out to a director who is filming. Understandably, he cannot take the time to read the script because he’s filming. But he wants to. He has expressed a desire to make the movie and we very much want him to. You tend to want to wait for that. I’m about to say to the agent, ‘Because of his circumstance, we are going to go out to other people.’ We hope he does it."
Shuler Donner hopes to begin "Wolverine" in the Fall, despite Jackman’s request for four extra months to bulk up. "I know. He’s thinking that, we’re thinking fall. I’m sorry, Hugh. But he knows that."
