Nicolas Cage discusses his role as Superman in The Flash

26 years earlier, the actor was to interpret Clark Kent in a Tim Burton film canceled at the last moment.

Warning, this article contains a spoiler about the film. The Flash !

Finally, Nicholas Cage was able to interpret Superman on the big screen! In the 90s, the actor almost played Clark Kent, in a film that ultimately never saw the light of day. Tim Burton was to direct the feature film titled Superman Lives. But after a chaotic pre-production period, it was finally canceled in 1997. Of this project, only an official photo remains, released before its abandonment.

Since then, the actor was able to lend his voice to the superhero in 2018 in the animated film Teen Titans Go!, but never put on his costume again. That was without counting the release of The Flash at the cinema last June. In the new DC, Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) travels to different universes, including one where Superman (played by Nicolas Cage) battles a huge spider. This is actually a scene that was supposed to appear in the abandoned 1997 film.

This furtive appearance then takes on a symbolic dimension for the actor, who has found “very satisfying to finally see the scene on screen”.

“But it was very fast. If you really want to know what I intended to do with this character, watch my performance in The city of angels. I was supposed to play Clark Kent after that, and I was already developing this alien otherness by playing this angel. It’s a perfect example of the tone I would have given it. He would have been a little funnier, but he would have had sensitivity, kindness and vulnerability, emotions that are both angelic and terrifying.”added Nicolas Cage.

The city of angels, directed by Brad Silberling in 1998, featured a modern-day angel. Occasionally taking on a human appearance, the latter aspires to make himself useful on Earth, although all the things that make life rich are forbidden to a celestial creature.

After this wink in The Flash and a leading role in Renfield, Nicolas Cage will star in Sympathy for the Devil, alongside Joel Kinnaman. However, no release date has been revealed for the moment in France.