James Gunn has finally announced who his main cast members will be in his new approach to a story told many times, Superman: Legacy. Ever since Henry Cavill announced that his time in the role would be over, people have been speculating and wondering as to who would next don the cape, but it isn’t just Superman getting recast, we also have a new Lois Lane, and the actress playing the tough as nails journalist will be none other than Rachel Brosnahan.
After months of waiting on our end and many, many auditions, screen tests, and chemistry readings on their end, DC Studios have finally found their Superman and Lois in the form of David Corenswet and Brosnahan. The two had often come up on many a fan cast and it has been a grueling process to get to this final outcome with Gunn and co-CEO Peter Safran taking months to make sure they nailed the casting. Brosnahan and Corenswet were among the few to test in front of the new co-CEOs in full costume and it would seem that all their hard work paid off after their casting was reported earlier today.
Both the actors had been on the radars of fans and execs alike, with Brosnahan apparently giving one of the best auditions of the whole process. For those who may not know much about the actress let’s take a look into her past work and why she will make an excellent Lois Lane to Corenswet’s Clark Kent.
Here’s where you may recognize Rachel Brosnahan from
Born in 1990 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Brosnahan worked in her first role while she was still in high school, back in 2009, in Michael Bay’s The Unborn. Whilst she was studying at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts she also took on small roles in episodes of some of the biggest shows at the time such as Gossip Girl, Grey’s Anatomy, and The Good Wife. Alongside these she also worked on stage and took on some roles in movies, gradually working her way up to more prominent roles in bigger productions.
By 2013 she had landed a role in the critically acclaimed series House of Cards playing Rachel Posner, a role that was only meant to be there for a few episodes but was expanded after Brosnahan impressed one of the showrunners. She was given a recurring role and was even nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series. In 2016 she went on to land a role in the Woody Allen series, Crisis in Six Scenes, as well as acted on stage playing Desdemona in Shakespeare’s Othello opposite David Oyelowo and Daniel Craig.
It was in 2017 though that Brosnahan really stepped into the limelight, taking on the lead role of Jewish house-wife turned stand-up comedian Midge Maisel in the much-applauded Amazon series The Marvellous Mrs. Maisel. Her character’s fast wit and sharp tongue earned the actress endless praise and accolades including a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress In A Comedy Series, two Golden Globe Awards, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, as well as two Critics’ Choice Television Awards.
The series just aired its final season earlier this year but during its run, the actress took on a number of other projects as well, appearing opposite Benedict Cumberbatch in the 2020 film The Courier, in the western Dead for a Dollar in 2022, and has returned to the stage opposite Oscar Isaac in the play The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window this year. Now, the actress is about to step into the world of superheroes with her role as Lois Lane, and if her character of Midge Maisel is anything to go by we can be assured that we are going to get a tough, funny, smart character that will most definitely be a force to be reckoned with, even for the likes of Superman.
Funnily enough, this wasn’t the only superhero role that the actress was open to, with many having pointed out that she could also have made an excellent Susan Storm in the upcoming Fantastic Four film. The actress was very interested in this role as well, though her name was a little further down on most people’s fan casting for the MCU role over the DC role. Well, the decision has been made and DC it is! Speaking just over a month ago on The View, when her casting was just a rumor still, the actress spoke about what it would be like to take on the role saying,
“It would be extraordinary. I grew up watching Lois Lane, this incredibly talented journalist, far from a damsel in distress, and I would jump at the chance if it arose.”
And jumped she has. It will be very interesting to see how she and Corenswet work together, and now the eyes of the world, and some of the most difficult-to-please fans in the universe are on her, we are sure she will do a phenomenal job. Superman: Legacy is set to reach theatres on July 11, 2025, with production starting at the beginning of next year.