Editorial Staff
There’s undoubtedly more to the story than the pages of said interview can condense, never the less interesting chat with Edward Norton over at New York Times on his brief stint as Marvel’s big screen Incredible Hulk.
When the “Fight Club” actor first signed to play the iconic superhero in the 2008 film “The Incredible Hulk”, he was not only enthusiastic about the film but gung-ho for an entire run of Hulk films.
“I laid out a two-film thing: The origin and then the idea of Hulk as the conscious dreamer, the guy who can handle the trip,” Norton explained. “And they were like, ‘That’s what we want!’ As it turned out, that wasn’t what they wanted”.
Up until Kevin Feige released a statement claiming they wanted an actor “who embodies the creativity and collaborative spirit of our other talented castmembers” – in turn bringing in Mark Ruffalo to take over as Bruce Banner for “The Avengers” – Norton said he had a good relationship with the Marvel bigwig.
“Yeah, which was cheap,” Norton said. “It was brand defensiveness or something. Ultimately they weren’t going for long, dark and serious. But it doesn’t matter.”
“We had positive discussions about going on with the films, and we looked at the amount of time that would’ve taken, and I wasn’t going to do that,” the actor continued. “I honestly would’ve wanted more money than they’d have wanted to pay me. But that’s not why I would’ve wanted to do another Hulk movie anyway.”
It’s not the first time an actor, playing a caped hero, has clashed with a studio over the creative direction of a franchise – and in turn, let it be known they wanted more money. One of the better/known fall outs occurred between Michael Keaton and Warner Bros, when the actor refused to reprise the role for a third film. Convinced the only way forward for the franchise was to go dark – later telling reporters he pitched something similar to Christopher Nolan’s “Dark Knight” to the studio – Keaton wanted no part of Joel Schumacher’s campy, comedic “Batman Forever.
