It appears 20th Century Fox and Channing Tatum have found their leading lady for the X-Men spinoff Gambit. A shortlist of actresses under consideration for the role of Belladonna Bourdreaux surfaced earlier this month that included Blue Is the Warmest Color star Lea Seydoux, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation standout Rebecca Ferguson, and Mad Max: Fury Road actress Abbey Lee. Ferguson ultimately opted to take a starring role opposite Emily Blunt in the drama The Girl on the Train instead, and now Deadline reports Fox has extended an offer to Seydoux to join Tatum in Gambit.
The film is a standalone picture focusing on the New Orleans native and fan-favorite comics character, a mutant with the power of tapping into the potential energy of inert objects and turning it into kinetic energy. Tatum has long wanted to play the character, and following the success of X-Men: Days of Future Past and with a growing X-universe in the works (Deadpool, New Mutants, Fantastic Fo—er probably not that one anymore), Fox finally obliged. It took a bit for Tatum and the studio to find a director, but Rise of the Planet of the Apes director Rupert Wyatt is now at the helm with production slated to get underway this fall.
Seydoux is a swell actress who’s been doing solid work in films like Inglourious Basterds and Midnight in Paris for years, but who truly broke out with a phenomenal performance in the masterful Blue Is the Warmest Color. She’s been keen on mixing adult dramas like The Lobster and Saint Laurent with franchise fare like Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol throughout her career, and so her signing onto Gambit doesn’t mean she’ll be forsaking more serious dramas anytime soon. She’s just now coming off a co-starring role in the next James Bond pic Spectre, but Gambit throws Seydoux into the superhero realm for the first time.
The actress will be playing the character Belladonna Bourdreaux, who in the comics was Gambit’s love interest and also a member of the Assassins’ Guild. She eventually gained powers of her own, so it’ll be interesting to see if the film goes that route or simply keeps the character as a grounded foil for Tatum’s mutant. Gambit is slated for release on October 7, 2016.
