Josh Gad confirms that he is not playing the Penguin in the upcoming DC film The Batman. Gad is the actor behind the character LeFou in the live-action Beauty and the Beast remake, as well as the voice of Olaf from Frozen. For a while, it looked like Gad was going to be stepping into another summer blockbuster with Matt Reeves' The Batman.
The Batman has gone through a lot of changes since it was initially announced. At first, Ben Affleck was expected to direct and star in the project, but Affleck has since stepped away from the role. Back in 2017, Matt Reeves was announced as the director, and at the end of last month, Robert Pattinson was cast as the new Batman. Several Batman villains are rumored to appear in the film, but as of right now it's believed that Oswald Cobblepot (the Penguin) and Selina Kyle (Catwoman) will be the main villains of the film. Despite Gad being rumored to be involved with the project for years, the actor has finally set the record straight.
Posting on Twitter, Gad denied that he is involved with The Batman. Gad had teased fans about playing the Penguin on several occasions, which often included fan-made art of him as the character. After responding to a fan on Twitter, Gad finally confirmed that he is not playing the Penguin, but did say that he enjoyed the fan art that people had been posting online. Gad's full tweet can be seen below:
Besides Pattinson being cast as Bruce Wayne, details on The Batman have remained scarce during development. The Batman is expected to start filming at the end of the year, but fans still don't know much about the plot or which villains will be included in the film. Vanessa Hudgens has shown interest in Catwoman and Dave Bautista wants to play Bane in The Batman, but no actors have been confirmed as of yet for roles besides Pattinson. As for the plot of the movie, all that is known is that The Batman won't be an origin story, but the character won't be as experienced as Affleck's Batman was.
While fans will certainly be disappointed that Gad won't be portraying the Penguin on the big screen, it shouldn't come as a huge shock. Back in 2017, Gad revealed that he was "Just having some fun" with fans when he shared fan art of him as the Penguin. Since then, he continued to share more Penguin fan art, which is part of the reason why the rumors escalated. Now that Gad officially isn't playing the Penguin, fans will likely continue to speculate on which other actors could play the character in The Batman.
Source: Josh Gad
