Kevin Smith says that Ben Affleck was his top choice to play Clark Kent in his scrapped Superman movie, along with Michael Rooker as Lex Luthor.
Ben Affleck was Kevin Smith's top choice to play Superman in his scrapped Superman Lives project. Affleck has been one of the most in-demand actors since the 1990s and has had a wide variety of roles teaming with some of the most high-profile directors.
One of Affleck's most well-known collaborators is Kevin Smith, as Affleck starred in six films from the Clerks director. Smith has been very public about his time working on a Superman project in the mid to late '90s that never got off the ground, Superman Lives. Smith's tale recounting the production is legendary, from producer Jon Peters insisting on Superman fighting a giant spider in the third act, which would later be used in Wild Wild West.
"I was writing it for Affleck, it was very Mallrats inspired because my Lex Luthor was Michael Rooker and my Superman was Ben. Ben was heating up, I think he had just been hired for Armageddon so I was like 'he could be a legit movie star'. He's got dark hair, I'm that uncreative where I'm like 'Ben has dark hair, Superman has dark hair. Ben's tall'.
Smith's script for Superman Lives landed Tim Burton to direct, and Burton hired Wesley Strick to rewrite the script. Nicolas Cage was cast as Superman and the project started to take shape with a summer 1998 release date set to coincide with Superman's 60th anniversary.
Affleck would go on to play a version of Superman in a very different way when he played actor George Reeves, who famously played Superman on television, in the 2006 film Hollywoodland, which happened to release in theaters the same year as Superman Returns. Affleck would of course join the DC Universe as Batman alongside Henry Cavill's Superman. While Rooker did not play Lex Luthor, he played a lesser-known DC supervillain, Savant, in The Suicide Squad.
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