Jesse Eisenberg has admitted that his role as Lex Luthor in Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice was “was so poorly received” that it set back his career.
The actor, who is currently starring in A Real Pain, told the Armchair Expert podcast that while he had been in other performances that were similarly poorly received, nothing else had such an impact as the 2016 DC movie and 2017’s Justice League.
He said: “I was in this Batman movie and the Batman movie was so poorly received, and I was so poorly received. I’ve never said this before and it’s kind of embarrassing to admit, but I genuinely think it actually hurt my career in a real way, because I was poorly received in something so public.
“I’ve been in poorly received things that just don’t see the light of day, and for the most part, no one knows. But this was so public, and I don’t read notices or reviews or movie press or anything, so I was unaware of how poorly it was received.”
Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice grossed $874million (£698.94million) globally but fared very badly with critics as did Justice League which also grossed $661million (£528.6million) worldwide.
Despite his critics, Eisenberg admitted that he enjoyed playing Superman’s nemesis.
“To me, it was a chance to play this great character that this great writer wrote, and I loved doing that,” he added.
“To play it is a joy, and to not play it isn’t something that I’m going to be ashamed to tell my kids about, because that is not an important genre in my life, even though I loved doing that movie.”
Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor in ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice’ CREDIT: Warner Bros. Entertainment/Sky
Meanwhile, the first trailer for James Gunn’s Superman was shared earlier this week.
Set for release on July 11, 2025, is the first movie in the new DC Universe, a soft reboot of the DC Extended Universe that will have united continuity and story across live-action films, TV series, animation and video games, with any DC adaptations not fitting into this continuity being referred to as DC Elseworlds.
David Corenswet (Pearl, The Politician) plays Superman, while Rachel Brosnahan and Nicholas Hoult are Lois Lane and Lex Luthor respectively. Also involved are the likes of Edi Gathegi, Anthony Carrigan, Nathan Fillion and Isabela Merced.
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