Tree Of Life actress Jessica Chastain looks to be the latest addition to the Iron Man 3 cast with Deadline reporting that she is currently in negotiations to join the project which is scheduled to begin shooting next month in North Carolina.
Chastain is being reported as playing a “sexy scientists,” which leads me to believe that the character will be Dr. Maya Hansen, a major player in the Iron Man comic book miniseries Extremis which it appears the threequel’s script is at least partly based on. Last week, Guy Pearce was announced as playing geneticist Aldrich Killian, another character from the Extremis story. In the comic Killian and Hansen are developers of nanotechnology weapons for the military. When their company’s funding is cut off, they arrange for the tech to be stolen by terrorists in the hope that a confrontation between the terrorists and Iron Man would prove that their work was worth continuing.
Chastain had originally been offered the role a while back buy initially turned it down due to scheduling conflicts with two other possible projects. Reportedly, Marvel Studios began scheduling meetings with Diane Kruger, Gemma Arterton and Isla Fisher, but Chastain’s calendar managed to clear itself so they jumped at the chance to have her in the film.
Written and directed by Shane Black (and co-written by Drew Pearce), Iron Man 3 also stars Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Scarlett Johansson and Ben Kingsley. It is set for release on May 3, 2013.
