Matthew Vaughn Will Not Be Directing X-Men: First Class
Posted 05.02.10 by BrentJS
It appears that comic book movie fans are not going to get a chance to see Kick-Ass director Matthew Vaughn's take on the young X-Men after all. Vaughn, who was initially signed on to direct X-Men: The Last Stand but dropped out at the last minute, was recently reported to be in talks to direct Fox's X-Men prequel, X-Men: First Class. Now, however, Deadline, citing "sources close to the director," has reported that Vaughn's discussions with Fox have broken down and he "won't be directing the movie."
X-Men: First Class, which sets the franchise clock back to the formative years of the outsider mutant team of heroes, is Fox's answer to the problem of an aging all-star cast with prohibitively high salaries. Bryan Singer, who directed the first two X-Men movies, was brought back into the fold to direct First Class, but had to take a producing role instead because of a scheduling conflict. Vaughn, whose fresh, teen-oriented Kick-Ass is in theaters now, was one of the first directors Fox approached to replace Singer and was said to be the "lead candidate" for the job.
With Vaughn having passed up the job, Louis Leterrier (Clash of the Titans), Timur Bekmambetov (Wanted), David Slade (The Twilight Saga: Eclipse), Daniel Espinosa (Snabba Cash), and Carl Erick Rinsch (47 Ronin) are all said to be in talks to direct. Fox is hoping to get First Class into production by late summer or early fall, so a director announcement should be forthcoming, possibly as early as next week. Jamie Moss (Street Kings) wrote the First Class screenplay based on an idea by Singer.