Jennifer Lawrence Says She's "In" for X-Men: First Class Sequel
Posted 03.14.12 by Ryan
Jennifer Lawrence has had a fairytale start to her young acting career, capping off her Academy Award nomination for Winter's Bone by appearing in last summer's X-Men: First Class and landing the lead role in next week's The Hunger Games. While The Hunger Games is likely to take up a lot of Lawrence's time over the next several years, the actress recently told HitFix that she's "in" for a X-Men: First Class sequel if "they write me in."
I don't know, I mean...if they write me in, then I'm in, but I don't even know if there'll be...I've only heard what everybody else has heard, just whispers. I haven't heard the official word yet.
What Lawrence has heard about the sequel we're not sure, though First Class producer (and screenwriter of 2006's X-Men: The Last Stand) Simon Kinberg confirmed last month that he is writing the First Class sequel and that director Matthew Vaughn will return as well, as revealed in a previous report. That sounds pretty official, though Lawrence is right that Twentieth Century Fox has yet to officially announce a sequel with a public statement or a release date. In fact, the most Fox has said publicly is what CEO Tom Rothman said last November, that "we have every hope of moving forward" with a First Class sequel as long as the script delivers.
As for whether Lawrence's character Mystique will be written in, that's probably an absolute certainty due not only to Lawrence's rising celebrity but also Mystique's involvement in the previous trilogy of X-Men movies. It wasn't lost on Lawrence that she was given the opportunity to play an iconic character.
It's a cool thing. It wasn't until later, [that I thought]..."I'm Mystique." That's a cool...she's kind of like a historic superhero, and that's really important to a lot of people, and these comics have been around for so long. It was a cool thing to be a part of.
Once The Hunger Games blows up the box office as it is expected to, perhaps Fox will make the sequel official and remind Lawrence of the contract option they have for her.