Evangeline Lilly turned down Hugh Jackman’s offer for ‘X-Men’ role

Evangeline Lilly has revealed that she wasn’t interested in Hugh Jackman’s offer to join him in the making of his next ‘X-Men’ film when he asked her on behalf of the producers.

While on a promotional tour for her new film, ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’, where Lilly stars alongside Paul Rudd who plays the title character, the actress revealed that she was approached by Hugh Jackman in 2011 on the set of ‘Real Steel’, a movie they were both working on at the time, to do an ‘X-Men’ film — but she declined.

Why did Evangeline Lilly turn down Hugh Jackman

Lilly has turned down other roles in superhero films, claiming that she has never been a fan of them.

In an interview with the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Lilly said that Jackman went to her and said the ‘X-Men’ team wanted to recruit her, but knew that Lilly wasn’t interested in taking on more acting work.

“[Jackman] said, ‘Hey, so, the X-Men guys are asking me if I would approach you because they know that you won’t talk to anybody,’” Lilly shared. “‘They knew I was working with you and were interested to know if it would ever interest you to do an X-Men thing.’”

Unimpressed by the offer, Lilly did not take any time to consider her response.

“I was like, ‘No. It doesn’t interest me. I’m not interested,’” she said.

Recounting the experience, Lilly mused that her refusal may not have gone over so well with the ‘Wolverine’ actor.

“I was like, ‘I feel like such a [...] because I’m talking to an X-Men! The X-Men! And I’m telling him, ‘No that doesn’t appeal. Like, what?!’ I felt so rude,” she said.

Lilly has turned down other superhero roles

Lilly has previously turned down roles for superhero movies, including Joss Whedon, who wanted her to do ‘Wonder Woman’. The actress said that the Hollywood veteran did not appreciate her lack of interest in becoming a DC character, as she was “too young to be that polite” to feign it.

“I was okay with that. I was okay with burning bridges,” she said. “I was okay with not having everyone in Hollywood wanna work with me.

“I just always had to do what felt right for me. And honestly I wasn’t into superhero movies and that’s the main reason why, in both of these instances, I just kind of felt like I don’t know what I get out of this.”