Heat Vision: What is the story?Singer: I can’t tell you that; it’s secret. But it’s basically about the formation of the X-Men. How they began and the relationship between a young Xavier and a young Magneto.
Heat Vision: I remember when you left “X3″ to do “Superman Returns.” It wasn’t under the best of circumstances.Singer: A lot of that was comical and exaggerated. When you set up a rather lucrative franchise and produce one of the company’s biggest television shows (“House”), I think there is a lot of good energy on a business level. But also, Tom Rothman and I have a very strong relationship from those early days of “X-Men 1″ when he ascended to the chairmanship and I was involved in this very important movie for the studio. We bonded then. So I think he was frustrated then, as was I, because I couldn’t do a third “X-Men,” but that moment of frustration passed. We have always looked at different projects to do together, but the timing was never right to do something like this. But now, it’s been about 10 years since the first “X-Men,” and this is a nice opportunity to look back at the origins of that universe.
Heat Vision: Do you think the X-Men can exhaust themselves? You’ve got the original three, you’ve got “Wolverine,” you’ve got a “Deadpool” and “Magneto” in the works …Singer: This story would probably utilize some of the Magneto story because it deals with a young Magneto, so it might supersede that because this would explore that relationship between a young energetic professor and a disenfranchised victim of the Holocaust. But no, I don’t see an exhaustion. The X-Men universe is boundless. These are great characters. And as young characters, they are quite different than the characters we have seen in the contemporary movies.
Heat Vision: Would you do “Jack the Giant Killer” first?Singer: Right now that is the plan. Unless there’s a problem in the development process. There is a script for “Jack”; we’re in visual development. We’ve got artwork and pre-viz that we are doing. But you never know how things go. I have a writer named Jamie Moss working on “First Class.”
Heat Vision: Why did you choose to work with him?Singer: He’s a really good writer, and of the writers I met with, he interpreted my story the best and brought the most to it. Because I’m so actively involved in the script development of my movies, I’m very hands-on, I need a certain kind of writer and a certain kind of availability to me. And he fit that bill. He’s quite talented.
