Tony Stark himself has been speaking about Iron Man 4 and the possibility of him starring once again as the playboy, billionaire, philanthropist, genius etc. With a release schedule all the ways up to 2019, it’s a distinct possibility that the tin-man figures into the Marvel game plan for the next few years.
Audiences would absolutely love a fourth Iron Man, but what about Robert Downey Jr. himself? The actor, speaking to EW says ““It’s down to Kevin [Feige, Marvel Studios president] and Ike [Perlmutter, CEO of Marvel Entertainment] and Disney to come to us with what the proposal is, and that’s on us to agree or disagree,” he said.“When things are going great, there’s a lot of agreement.”
While it’s a typical play on the media, it’s not like he can play the broke card. Forbes have listed him as the highest paid actor in the world having earned $75 million in the last year alone! At the same time, while RDJ knows Iron Man is Marvel’s trump card and an audience favourite, one wonders if rattling the Feige cage for more cash is the best option? I’d hazard a guess that Tony Stark could very easily be “stuck” in the suit for a movie, and thus remove the actor out of the equation completely.
Last April he spoke to GQ and didn’t really seem too confident about another Iron Man movie stating "It got me thinking about how big the message from your cosmic sponsor needs to be before you pick it up. How many genre movies can I do? How many follow-ups to a successful follow-up are actually fun? I come from a family of very innovative writers and directors and actors and artists, and the circle of friends they were in were the people I heard having pun-offs playing poker at two in the morning, and it was just the most comforting aspect of my childhood. So there's this kind of legacy of souls from what I consider to be a very particular time in entertainment, and I'm sensing a return to that." Make of that what you will.
I’m a huge RDJ fan. Give the guy what he deserves, and I’m not shitting on his parade. This is the way things worked. He was quite public about salaries for his Avengers colleagues back in the day (lets just say RDJ was paid substantially more than any of the rest of them) and he seems like a top bloke.
Marvel aren’t stupid, but at the same time one actor won’t run a studio or hold them to ransom. However, Downey Jr. IS Tony Stark, and Marvel know that too!
So enough musings! Bring on Iron Man 4!
