Jonathan Rhys Meyers Dismisses ‘Star Wars: Episode VII’ Rumors

Jonathan Rhys Meyers said he doesn’t believe rumors that he could be cast in Star Wars: Episode VII.

The 36-year-old dismissed reports that he would be reuniting with director JJ Abrams. Rhys Meyers co-starred in Mission: Impossible III in 2006. The rumors started circulating in May.

“Look, I’ve worked with JJ,” Rhys Meyers told Entertainment Weekly. “But I don’t believe rumors.”

The Tudors star hasn’t appeared in very many big Hollywood movies and said he hardly watches films.

“To be honest, I don’t watch many movies. There’s very, very few films that I will go to the cinema to see,” he said. “I’ll go to the cinema to see anything by Paul Thomas Anderson or Nicholas Winding Refn or Mike Leigh or Steven Spielberg. But I don’t go to the cinema very often. I read a lot.”

Jonathan Rhys Meyers isn’t the only one brushing off Star Wars: Episode VII casting rumors. Ewan McGregor, who played Obi-Wan Kenobi, said he hadn’t been contacted about reprising the role in the new sequel.

“They haven’t phoned me yet,” McGregor said. “I’d be up for it [if they ask].”

McGregor did admit that there might be a bit of difficulty making the role work.

“I think it’s a good idea,” he said. “The only bit that I could get away with doing is after the last one I made, Episode III, before Alec Guinness (who played Ben Kenobi in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi), there’s that period where he’s in the desert.”

Jonathan Rhys Meyers said if he did get a role in Star Wars: Episode VII, it would probably be on the dark side of the Force.

“I play bad guys because I look like one. There’s something in my physicality that’s quite intense and lends me to being feral,” he said. “I mean, I’d love to be this lovely relaxed guy doing rom-coms, but I just don’t get those types of offers. I suppose I’m forever sort of the antihero.”

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