It took Nicolas Cage years to break his comic book movie duck, but clearly he enjoyed the Ghost Rider experience, because less than two years later he’s at it again. This time, the artist formerly known as Nicky Coppola has joined the cast of Kick-Ass, Matthew Vaughn’s adaptation of the Mark Millar/John Romita Jr. comic book.
Intriguingly, though, Cage won’t be playing the lead role in Vaughn’s adaptation of the ultra-violent Marvel title, which the director adapted along with his Stardust writing partner, Jane Goldman.
No, for the title part and leading role – of a teenager called Dave Lizewski who, tired of being a dweeb, reinvents himself as a (powerless) superhero named Kick-Ass – has gone to an unknown British actor called Aaron Johnson (who can be seen in Angus, Thongs And Perfect Snogging).
Cage will play a former cop who, in his quest to bring down a druglord, has trained his teenage daughter (Chloe Moretz) to be a lethal weapon.
Also joining the cast – which already boasted McLovin himself, Christopher Mintz-Plasse as Kick-Ass’ nemesis, The Red Mist – is Lyndsy Fonseca, who plays the object of Kick-Ass’ affection (unfortunately, she thinks he’s gay).
It’s all utterly demented, but then so was Wanted, and the movie version of that turned out ok. It’ll be interesting to see how faithful to the comic book the Kick-Ass movie is, given that Wanted also differed quite substantially from the source material.
But it’s good to see Cage taking on a supporting role in a film like this (the budget will only be around £30 million). He’s been going through something of a revitalisation of late, taking roles in Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant and John Carpenter’s Scared Straight to counterbalance all those big blockbusters he does. It’ll be fascinating to see how this turns out – what do you think, readers? Has Vaughn pulled off a casting coup along the lines of Robert De Niro in Stardust? Or should Cage have called it a comic book day with Johnny Blaze?