No, Daniel Radcliffe Does Not Want to Play Wolverine

Daniel Radcliffe, who stars in the new comedic biopic Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, has no desire to pull off what would be one of the wildest acting swings of all time by next playing Wolverine.

As he makes clear in a new interview, the Wolverine talk you may have seen online is just the latest fantasy casting idea that begins and ends with fans online, but has no basis in reality.

“It’s purely a press tour rumor; I say something, and then occasionally I get bored of answering that way so I say something different, and that sets it off again. I should just never open my mouth,” he says in a new GQ interview.

And after years of playing Harry Potter, Radcliffe has little desire to lock himself into another major franchise. Now that the X-Men are soon to be part of the Marvel Universe, thanks to Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox, which released the X-Men and Wolverine movies, whoever next signs up for the role should be prepared to spend years or even decades flashing those shiny claws. The MCU isn’t known for short contracts.

“I just don’t ever want to get locked into something,” Radcliffe says, “that I am not sure I will be able to love the same amount the whole time.”

And of course there’s the fact that the previous Wolverine hasn’t quite given up the job: After saying that Logan would be his final Wolverine movie, Hugh Jackman announced in September that he has agreed to play the clawed, fast-healing mutant berserker in a third Deadpool film to be released in 2024.

Also, if you’re looking for Daniel Radcliffe to play an intense, gritty role like Wolverine, we’re delighted to report that his new film will definitely not provide that experience. Director Eric Appel recently assured us that the comedy involved “absolutely no research on Al’s actual life.”

“It was basically us taking like all of our favorite tropes from biopics and just — it’s really satirizing the entire biopic genre. Not just rock biopics, like The Doors or Walk The Line or Bohemian Rhapsody. It’s also Boogie Nights and Forrest Gump, like fictional biopics as well,” Appel said. “They all sort of follow the same storytelling template, and it was us kind of deconstructing that and then putting it back together in the most weird, surprising way.”

While Radcliffe plays Al in the movie, Weird Al himself appears as well, playing record executive Tony Scotti.

“One of the most bizarre Weird Al moments was directing a scene where Daniel Radcliffe is playing Weird Al and Weird Al is playing record executive Tony Scotti and having to direct that, and walking on the set and saying, ‘Hey, Al, I have a note,’” and then two people look up at me,” Appel told MovieMaker at the Newport Beach Film Festival, where Weird: The Al Yankovic Story was the opening night film.

Weird: The Al Yankovic Story will begin streaming on The Roku Channel on Friday. 

Main image: Danielle Radcliffe as Weird Al Yankovic in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.