Crisis on Infinite Earths included a lot of familiar faces, as DC heroes from multiple realities came together for on epic adventure. At the time, executive producer Marc Guggenheim revealed that he tried, and failed, to get Nicolas Cage to agree to an appearance as Superman, but the showrunner admits to having serious regrets about ever mentioning that.
"I know I've talked about Nic Cage, but ever since I did that, I've since felt pretty bad," Guggenheim told Fake Nerd Podcast, "because I don't want anyone -- like, let's call him Person X. If we went to Person X and Person X said no, I don't want Person X's Twitter feed blowing up with, 'Why didn't you play the role? Why didn't you appear in Crisis?'"
"Everyone's got their reasons, and for some people, they were legitimately busy," he continued. "For other people, they just had no desire. For other people, they wanted more money than we had to spend. There's a whole host of reasons why various cameos didn't come into being. I don't see any good coming from going into specifics for why those various cameos didn't happen."
It seems likely that The CW couldn't pay what an actor like Nic Cage would want for an appearance in shows like these, and he never actually got to play Superman on the big screen.
Though photos of him suited up for costume tests in Tim Burton's Superman Lives have gone viral in recent years, that's as far as the 1998 movie got, and everything we've heard about the film have pointed to it not happening being for the best. Seeing him as Superman would have been an absolute blast, however, so maybe Guggenheim shouldn't have teased us with what could've been!
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Crisis on Infinite Earths news from CBM!
THE KICKOFF TO THE EPIC TELEVISON CROSSOVER EVENT, CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS - The Monitor (guest star LaMonica Garrett) sends Harbinger (guest star Audrey Marie Anderson) to gather the worlds' greatest heroes - Supergirl (Melissa Benoist), The Flash (guest star Grant Gustin), Green Arrow (guest star Stephen Amell), Batwoman (guest star Ruby Rose), White Canary (guest star Caity Lotz), The Atom (guest star Brandon Routh) and Superman (guest star Tyler Hoechlin) - in preparation for the impending Crisis. With their worlds in imminent danger, the superheroes suit up for battle while J'onn (David Harewood) and Alex (Chyler Leigh) recruit Lena (Katie McGrath) to help them find a way to save the people of Earth-38. Jesse Warn directed the episode with story by Robert Rovner & Marc Guggenheim and teleplay by Derek Simon & Jay Faerbe.