Nicki Fink's deadline Holloywood made the announcement that Mickey Rourke will in fact play a "Russian villain" in Iron Man 2 -- which we all know is the badguy known as Whiplash.
"He may not have won the Oscar, but Mickey Rourke is taking his nomination to the bank. I just heard that ICM has scored its second casting deal for Marvel's Iron Man 2. After at first being low-balled by the studio to the tune of $250K, Rourke has signed on for the role of the Russian villain in the sequel after his agent David Unger got the quote up to a "significant" level despite this punishing economic climate where the studios are taking advantage of talent. (No wonder Mickey kept thanking Unger so profusely in acceptance speeches for the BAFTA, Golden Globe, Spirit, and other awards.) But don't expect Marvel to confirm any of this: they won't until all the i's are dotted and t's crossed on the contracts. I can also tell you that Sony was considering hiring Mickey to play the villain in Spider-Man 4. Rourke happens to be in Russia this week promoting Fox Searchlight's The Wrestler, and I hear he'll start researching his new role immediately there. Marvel did the same thing to ICM's Toni Howard client Samuel L. Jackson. The studio low-balled him, but then eventually came up a lot and locked in a long-term commitment for Jackson to play Nick Fury in as many as 9 Marvel films, including Iron Man 2."
This is great news. Thank God, this shows the studios commitment to only put out quality material with quality actors. The other intresting point in this story is that Sony is also considering Mickey for the bad guy role in Spiderman 4. Can anyone say Kraven?
Later, the same website reported that Scarlett Johansson did indeed get the role of Black Widow after actress Emily Blunt was unable to take the job. The site said that Johansson had actually turned down for the role in favor of Emily, but now it turns out that she was the closest second place--as she has been tapped to take the part.