‘Shazam!’ star Zachary Levi backs claim Dwayne Johnson axed ‘Black Adam’ cameo

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Two DC stars may never battle on the big screen, but that isn’t stopping one of them from picking a fight on Instagram.

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Shazam! star Zachary Levi is sounding off after a recent report that Dwayne Johnson nixed a potential cameo for his superhero in Black Adam.

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In an Instagram Story, Levi posted an image to a report appearing on The Wrap that alleges Johnson didn’t allow Shazam! Fury of the Gods director David F. Sandberg to include a scene in the recent sequel that would have shown members of the Justice Society of America recruiting Shazam to join their team. A separate post-credits scene teasing a clash with Shazam in Black Adam was also blocked in favour of bringing back Henry Cavill’s Superman.

Adding his own commentary, Levi wrote: “The truth shall set you free.”

“There were supposed to be characters from (Black Adam’s) Justice Society, but that fell apart three days before we were going to roll cameras,” Sandberg said in a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

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An anonymous exec weighed in further telling the trade publication that Johnson “tries to sell himself as bigger than the movie.”

“He’s one of the few people who always thinks he’s the most important person in any situation or room.”

Black Adam was a passion project that Johnson had spent over a decade trying to get made.

“It was a 15-year long process … fighting,” Johnson told Postmedia at the film’s Canadian premiere last fall.

After he last appeared as Superman in 2017’s Justice League, Johnson added that bringing Cavill back was no easy thing.

“There were a lot of phone calls — and a lot of face-to-face meetings — to get that across the finish line, as one can imagine,” Johnson said. “I can talk to you — and my team can talk to you — about how passionate we are about this and why we feel this serves not only Black Adam but the larger DC Universe, but more important than that, it takes care of the fans. So it was phone calls, meetings and it (took) years to get that done.”

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But with just US$393 million at the worldwide box office, Black Adam was a financial disappointment, with Variety reporting the film was on track to lose as much as $100 million. Johnson went on the offensive to refute that claim issuing his own story to Deadline, proclaiming Black Adam was profitable.

Behind the scenes, there were rumblings that Johnson was trying to carve out a bigger slice of the DC universe that would have centred on other Black Adam characters, including the Justice Society of America, as well as expanding on the Black Adam vs. Superman showdown, which was teased in the film’s end-credits scene.

After the film’s tepid box office, Johnson acknowledged that the character would not be part of the first wave of titles from DC Studios’ new heads, James Gunn and Peter Safran.

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“James Gunn and I connected, and Black Adam will not be in their first chapter of storytelling,” Johnson wrote in a statement in December.

Cavill, who departed his starring role in Netflix’s The Witcher to announce his return as the Man of Steel, was forced to issue a statement confirming he was hanging up his cape after Gunn and Safran opted to go with a younger actor (who has yet to be cast) for DC’s next Superman movie.

Using a football analogy at the Oscars, Johnson said the change in leadership at DC Studios meant there was no clear path for either him or Cavill in Gunn and Safran’s plans.

“It’s almost like when you have a pro football team and your quarterback wins championships and your head coach wins championships and then a new owner comes in and says, ‘Not my coach, not my quarterback. I’m going to go with somebody new,’” Johnson told Variety, adding that he has no plans to try and play a different superhero.

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It’s likely a bitter pill for the action man, after he hinted that he intended on playing the character for years to come.

“I’m 100% committed to not only Black Adam, but then expanding the Black Adam universe and the DC universe,” Johnson said at a press event Postmedia was in attendance at last summer.

Meanwhile, Fury of the Gods stumbled in its first weekend of release earning only US$30.5 million at the North American box office.

After the announcement that DC Studios is getting a reset under Gunn and Safran, Fury of the Gods is one of several holdovers from the Zack Snyder-era that also includes the upcoming Flash, Blue Beetle and a new Aquaman in December.

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Levi tried to defend the film on social media, writing, “I think the biggest issue we’re having is marketing. This is a perfect family movie, and yet a lot of families aren’t aware of that. Which is just a shame.”

He also conceded that angry Snyder fans may have played a part in the film’s failure.

His Fury of the Gods castmate Rachel Zegler also waded into the fray touting the film’s 85% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

“Our film is actually very good,” Zegler wrote. “It’s just cool to hate on fun nowadays. That’s okay. We’re good.”

Sandberg responded to lukewarm reviews earlier this week, tweeting, “On Rotten Tomatoes I just got my lowest critic score and my highest audience score on the same film. I wasn’t expecting a repeat of the first movie critically but I was still a little surprised because I think it’s a good film. Oh well.”

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