Matt Bomer says he once signed a contract to play Superman in three Warner Bros. films, but the deal was scrapped after he was outed as gay before he publicly came out.
Bomer, 46, made the revelation during an appearance on The Hollywood Reporter's "Awards Chatter" podcast on Monday, June 10. He said he was signed on in the mid-2000s to portray Clark Kent/Superman in a film that was ultimately never made.
"This is a very early iteration of Superman written by J.J. Abrams called "Superman: Flyby," I think is what it was called, and it never came to light," Bomer said.
At the time, he was on the soap opera "Guiding Light," and producers wrote his character off the show because they believed he had a serious chance to become the Man of Steel.
“It looked like I was the director’s choice for the role,” Bomer recalled. “I signed a three-picture deal at Warner Bros.”
Asked whether his sexual orientation was a factor in losing the role, Bomer said, "Yeah, that’s my understanding." The "Magic Mike" star didn't publicly come out as gay until 2012, after he was already married to husband Simon Halls.
"That was a time in the industry when something like that could still really be weaponized against you," he said. "How, and why, and who, I don’t know, but yeah, that’s my understanding.”
Bomer is not the only one who remembers it that way. According to Advocate, author Jackie Collins addressed the scrapped Superman deal during a 2012 interview with Gaydar Radio.
"Someone didn't like him and told [the producers] he was gay," Collins reportedly said. "They said, 'No, no, we can't cast you.' The reason he didn't get cast was because he was gay."
—TMX contributed to this report.