JAMES MCAVOY
Is having a beast of a year…
The Scot is so hot right now.
On the cusp of turning 40, James McAvoy is having his best year yet. We don’t mean voicing the garden ornament in Sherlock Gnomes or his uncredited cameo in Deadpool 2. No, it’s the movies and TV shows he has clogging up the pipeline that quicken the heart, with M. Night Shyamalan’s Unbreakable/ Split sequel Glass and Simon Kinberg’s X-Men: Dark Phoenix both in post-production.
But that’s just two of the reasons McAvoy is set for an, ahem, first-class future. Currently filming are It: Chapter Two and miniseries Watership Down, the former seeing our man play Losers leader Bill Denbrough and the latter lending his voice to rabbit Hazel. Then he’ll step into the shoes of Lord Asriel in a BBC miniseries of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy – and hopefully right the wrongs of the abortive 2007 movie adap, The Golden Compass.
“Me, Bruce [Willis], Sam [L. Jackson] and Sarah Paulson have got the four big parts in Glass,” says McAvoy, whose Kevin Wendell Crumb – or The Beast, one of his 23 personalities – will pursue Willis’ David Dunn. That’s all he’ll say, relying on his dry humour to swerve questions: “If it’s a good film, the fans will react well. If it’s not, they won’t.”
McAvoy has been in demand since trotting to the world’s attention as Mr. Tumnus in 2005’s The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe. Career highs include The Last King Of Scotland and Atonement – and three previous X-outings as Charles Xavier. Dark Phoenix will see Sophie Turner’s Jean Grey possessed by cosmic entity the Phoenix Force, which boosts her powers and sends her rampaging through the galaxy.
“I get a lot more time with the young cast in this one,” says McAvoy. “Sophie kills it. The relationship between her and Jen Lawrence as Raven is really interesting and quite profound. It’s a film about a family coming apart.” Unlike McAvoy’s career, which has never been more together.
ETA | 2019 / GLASS, X-MEN: DARK PHOENIX AND IT: CHAPTER TWO OPEN NEXT YEAR.