The one genre Emily Blunt wants nothing to do with: “I don’t have this burning desire”
Starting her career in a string of British productions like the Bafta-winning My Summer of Love and the television film Boudica, Emily Blunt carved out a place for herself as an actor who could effortlessly play complex characters. With an affinity for period pieces, Blunt soon picked up more television roles in the form of Henry VIII and Agatha Christie’s Poirot, but it was her move to Hollywood that changed everything for her.
In 2006, she could be seen in The Devil Wears Prada alongside Anne Hathaway and Meryl Streep, a performance that earned her significant acclaim. From there, Blunt has managed to assert herself as one of the most diverse stars in Hollywood, mainly because she doesn’t limit herself to any one genre. In fact, she has tried her hand at a wide variety of cinematic styles.
Not only has she lent her voice to various animated films like Gnomeo and Juliet and appeared in kid-friendly films like Mary Poppins Returns, but she has also done horror with the A Quiet Place series, action with Sicario and Edge of Tomorrow, musicals with Into the Woods, and Oscar-winning drama with Oppenheimer.
There is one genre that Blunt isn’t interested in, however, and that’s superhero movies. Considering the fact she has appeared in big-budget studio films like the action-adventure movie Jungle Cruise and the fantasy film The Huntsman: Winter’s War, it’s slightly surprising that Blunt is not interested in Marvel or DC.
Yet, in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Blunt said, “I really understand that [superhero movies] are like a religion for a lot of people. They don’t appeal to me in the same way. I don’t have this burning desire to play a superhero.”
Indeed, many people are addicted to superhero movies these days, which are some of the most profitable kinds of films getting churned out by Hollywood right now. Stacked with well-known stars and relying on the audience’s obsession with these pre-existing characters, movies like the Avengers series consistently break box-office records and guarantee an overwhelming amount of profit.
There has been much debate surrounding the genre, and while some attempts to explore classic superhero characters, like Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight series, have been widely praised, Marvel is much more divisive. Martin Scorsese once called Marvel movies “not cinema”, believing them to be capitalistic endeavours aiming to please audiences rather than challenge or provoke.
We can’t be certain that Blunt agrees with Scorsese’s argument, but she certainly doesn’t have any desire to perform in a flashy ensemble of actors in a superhero movie. Interestingly, Blunt was actually the first choice to play Black Widow in Iron Man 2, a role that Scarlett Johansson took on instead. She cited scheduling conflicts as the reason for turning the part down rather than any direct aversion to superhero films.
However, during an interview on Happy, Sad, Confused, she referenced her The Fall Guy co-star Ryan Gosling by saying, “I thought we wore it as a badge of honour that we weren’t in superhero movies”. It seems as though Blunt probably won’t be heading towards Marvel anytime soon.
