Henry Cavill may have appeared for the briefest bit of screentime in Deadpool & Wolverine as a Variant of Wolverine, but he sure put his all into the role. That is at least according to director Shawn Levy, who revealed the former Superman actor smoked cigars for so long that he became physically ill.
“He kept that cigar lit and in his mouth for the entirety of the shoot day,” Levy told the New York Times. “I remember hearing the next day that Henry was sick to his stomach because he had been inhaling cigar smoke for eight hours straight, but never once did he waver.”
In the movie, Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) is traveling the multiverse to find a new Wolverine for his timeline, after discovering his version — the one from 2017’s Logan — has died. All of the rest of the variants are played by Hugh Jackman, except for one: the Cavillerine. The cameo mostly involves Deadpool freaking out about Henry Cavill playing Wolverine, and trying to coax him over to Marvel full-time. “We’ll treat you so much better than those s**tf**ks down the street,” Deadpool quips, referring to Cavill’s time with Warner Bros. Discovery as part of the DCEU.
As it turns out, that’s sort of what happened in real life, too. While Cavill appeared as Superman at the end of Black Adam, and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson teased his full-time return to the role, it was definitely a cart before the horse situation. James Gunn and Peter Safran took over DC Studios, and by December of 2022, Cavill announced he was no longer coming back as Superman. The stars aligned, though, as Deadpool & Wolverine was being put together at the same time.
“If we’re going to talk about him, we must call him by his actual credited name, the Cavillerine, which Ryan coined,” Levy told Variety. “I knew it was undeniable as soon as Ryan came up with that term. He said ‘yes’ right away because he knew it would be subversive and playful. It was also with a lot of affection for him and his body of work, and playing with his legacy as a DC hero now that he’s appearing as a variant of a Marvel hero.”
No harm, no foul. But with a positive reception to Cavill as Wolverine in the movie, will he adopt the role full-time with the MCU’s new X-Men movie? TBD — though we’d argue that if Marvel Studios wants a new Wolverine, Dafne Keen’s X-23 is right there.
As for Cavill, he’s just having fun. Referencing the debacle of his CGI-removed mustache in Justice League, the actor posted a still of himself in Deadpool & Wolverine on Instagram with the caption, “To be safe, I shaved the moustache off for this one. Just the moustache.”
Deadpool & Wolverine is now in theaters.
