Matthew Vaughn claims he quit X-Men film over ‘odd’ studio trick played on Halle Berry

‘I thought, ‘If you’re going to do that to an Oscar-winning actress, then I quit’,’ director said

Halle Berry was tricked into starring in a 2006 X-Men film, director Matthew Vaughn has claimed.

Berry played the Marvel character Storm in the Brett Ratner-directed 2006 film, reprising the role from X-Men (2000) and X2 (2003).

Vaughn was originally hired to direct X-Men: The Last Stand, but ultimately quit the project.

He has now claimed his decision stemmed from the discovery of the alleged manner in which distributor 20th Century Fox recruited Berry into signing onto the sequel.

According to the director, whose other credits include Kick-Ass and the Kingsman films, Berry was allegedly lured into starring in X-Men: The Last Stand using a fake script that prioritised her character in the opening scene.

Speaking on a panel at New York Comic-Con, as highlighted by MovieWeb, Vaughn claimed this was “one of the main reasons” he quit the film.

He told the audience: “This is a true story and I don’t care if I’m not meant to say it. Hollywood is really political and odd. I went to an executive’s office and I saw an X3 script. It was a lot fatter. I asked, ‘What is this draft?’ They were like, ‘Don’t worry about it.’

“So I grabbed it, and opened the first page, and it said, ‘Africa. Kids dying from no water, and Storm creates a thunderstorm to save all these children.’ I thought it was a pretty cool idea.”

Vaughn continued: “I said, ‘What is this?’ They said, ‘This is the Halle Berry’s script because she hasn’t signed on yet. This is what she wants it to be. And once she signs on, we’ll throw it in the bin.’

“I thought, ‘If you’re going to do that to an Oscar-winning actress who plays Storm, I quit.’

Berry ended up starring in the film, which was wirtten by Simon Kinberg and Zak Penn. However, she does not appear in the opening scene, which is a flashback showing Charles “Professor X” Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Erik “Magneto” Lehnsherr (Ian McKellen) meeting a young Jean Grey at her parents’ house in 1986.

Halle Berry was allegedly tricked into starring in 2006 ‘X-Men’ film (Getty Images for Fast Company)

The Independent has contacted Berry as well as Disney, who acquired Fox in 2019, for comment.

Vaughn went onto direct Stardust instead of X-Men: The Last Stand, but directed X-Men: First Class in 2011.

Berry returned as Storm in X-Men: Days of Future Past, which was directed by Bryan Singer, in 2014.