Paul Bettany, who was last seen playing Charles Darwin along side his Wife, Jennifer Connelly (playing Emma Darwin) in the Jon Amiel film CREATION (a partly biographical, partly fictionalized account of Charles Darwin’s relationship with his eldest daughter, Annie, as he struggles to write On the Origin of Species) – recently sat down to do an interview, in which he was asked whether or not he’s recorded his voice over for Tony Stark’s artificial intelligence “manservant” Jarvis, in Iron Man 2.
So far, he hasn’t gotten the call.
“It’s as mysterious to me as it was the first time. And this is absolutely true: I was on the set of Legion. It was the weekend after Iron Man opened, and some of the crew came in and were like, ‘Hey, I was listening to Iron Man. You’re in Iron Man, right?’ ‘No, I’m not.’ And they said, ‘Well, it sounds like you.’ And then I went, ‘Oh, wait! I am!,'” Bettany recalled with a laugh.”
“It was an hour[‘s worth of work]. I got rung up. The director [Jon Favreau], who I know and have worked with as actors [in Wimbledon], said, ‘Do you wanna do this thing?’ ‘Yeah, sure. F*** it. I’ll do Iron Man.’ I went in. He’s a very funny human being, obviously, and I laughed my ass off for about an hour. Literally said a couple of lines, went downstairs, got in a cab and went home,” Bettany said. “And I had, swear to God, wiped it out of my mind. People would say to me, ‘You’re in Iron Man!’ ‘No, I’m not. Oh, no, yeah, I suppose I am!’ So, it’s [just] as mysterious. I don’t know what I’m doing, whether I come back or not.”
Fortunately for fans of JARVIS, because it only took Bettany about an hour to record his part for the first film, he can probably phone in his voice over during the last hour of post production and they’ll have their Jarvis. While it would definitely be disappointing if Bettany weren’t to reprise his voice role for Iron Man 2, I don’t think we have anything to worry about at this stage.
Bettany will be starring in the forthcoming films, LEGION (January 22, 2010) and PRIEST (October 1, 2010).
Iron Man 2 opens May 7, 2010.
