Robert Pattinson In Line To Play The Dark Knight In Matt Reeves ‘The Batman’
According to reports today, Matt Reeves has found his Dark Knight, as Robert Pattinson is being lined up to don the cowl in ‘The Batman’.
Back in January, Warner Bros has set a release date of 25th June 2021 for the upcoming film, which meant the hunt was on for a new Batman. Ben Affleck had been the latest actor to play the cinematic Caped Crusader in ‘Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice’, ‘Suicide Squad’ and ‘Justice League’ movies. He was originally set to star, write and direct ‘The Batman’, but decided to step away from the project so Matt Reeves (‘Planet of the Apes’ films, ‘Felicity’) joined as writer and director. It was initially thought Affleck might still star in the Reeves version of the movie, but he decided to walk away entirely from his role as Gotham’s protector.
According to Variety, ‘The Twilight Saga’ star Robert Pattinson is in current pole position to take over the cowl from Affleck. The deal is still being worked out, but he is the top choice for writer/director Reeves.
Whilst he is best known for playing sparkly vampire Edward in the ‘Twilight’ movies, the 33yr-old actor has become something of an arthouse movie darling since he last wore the fangs in 2012. He has four movies lined up to release this year including Claire Denis’ ‘High Life’, Robert Eggers’ ‘The Lighthouse’, which premieres at the Cannes Film Festival, Netflix film ‘The King’ and Ciro Guerra’s ‘Waiting for the Barbarians’ opposite Johnny Depp. He is also due to star in Batman Trilogy director Christopher Nolan’s next (currently untitled) movie due for release in July 2020.
Reeves had been pushing towards casting a younger actor in the role when he took over the project, as the film is believed to be set earlier on The Dark Knight’s crime-fighting career. Pattinson may look young, but he would be older than Christian Bale when he took the role at 31 in ‘Batman Begins’, making RPatts the second youngest actor to take the part. If the deal does go ahead, Pattinson would be the 9th actor to take on the role on the big screen, joining Lewis Wilson (1943), Robert Lowery (1949), Adam West (1966), Michael Keaton (1989-92), Val Kilmer (1995), George Clooney (1997), Christian Bale (2005-12) and Ben Affleck (2016-17).
It was also nice of Reeves to look at casting someone who has a rhyming name that can rival Batfleck for a new fan-moniker… Pattman surely has to be the obvious choice! Or maybe Batpatt?.. We’ll have to see what catches on!
