In Neil Gaiman’s epic Sandman series, there exists a library containing all the greatest books that were never written, merely dreamt. The Lost Road by J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Dickens’ The Return of Edwin Drood, Jonathan Swift’s The Last Voyage of Lemuel Gulliver — they all line the endless shelves of the Library of Dreams.
Gailman’s creation may likely have been inspired by a short story written by Jorge Luis Borges, “The Library of Babel.” In the story, the narrator describes the world in which he lives: a library made up of a seemingly endless expanse of cramped galleries full of books — all books, with every conceivable arrangement of characters across all the pages.
Those who exist in this universe know that somewhere there is a volume containing every aspect of their lives — past, present, and future — and the truths of existence. The possibilities of limitless information soon dash the expectations of many as they come to the realization that the information they most desire will likely never be found. Faced with access to limitless information, misinformation, nonsense, and fantasy, sects form. People isolate themselves. Yes. It’s pretty much the internet.
I say all this to get to one topic: Nicholas Cage’s aspirations to play the obscure Batman villain Egghead.
Following the release of The Batman, Cage spoke with reporters at SXSW and expressed his desire to bring this character from Batman’s past to the big screen.
“The villain that Vincent Price played on the 60s show, Egghead, I think I want to have a go at Egghead,” said Cage. “I think I can make him absolutely terrifying. And I have a concept for Egghead. So let them know over at Warner Brothers, I’m down for Egghead.”
For those unaware, Egghead was played by Vincent Price in a handful of episodes in the Batman TV series featuring Adam West. Egghead speaks in egg-based puns. He throws exploding eggs full of laughing gas. This forces Batman and Robin to take sad pills.
In the show, Egghead is described as the smartest villain the Dynamic Duo has ever faced. His henchmen are named Benedict and Foo Yung. His assistant is Ms. Bacon. He deduces that Bruce Wayne is Batman, but is soon dissuaded.
In one episode, Egghead gains legal ownership of Gotham City. Robin describes it as “the saddest day of his young life.” This is wild since he saw his family fall to their deaths in a tragic circus accident. Later Egghead steals a bunch of radium that he uses to try to hatch a dinosaur egg.
All of this is to say Egghead will never be in a major Batman movie — not even with Nicolas Cage giving it his damnedest. But that doesn’t mean people aren’t fascinated.
Cage’s comments lit up the internet. Everyone wanted to hear his thoughts on the ovum-obsessed baddie.
While Cage has portrayed Ghost Rider and Big Daddy from Kick Ass on the big screen and voiced Superman and Spider-Man Noir in animated features, larger roles in the major comic book movie landscape have repeatedly fallen apart for the Academy Award winner.
Cage is a well-known lover of comic book superheroes. In 2002 he auctioned off his comic collection for $1.6 million. In 2011 Cage set a record, selling his high-grade copy of Action Comics No. 1 featuring the first appearance of Superman for more than $2 million. Clearly superheroes are close to the man’s heart. The same can be said for villains.
Cage was set to play Superman in Tim Burton’s take on the franchise, but the picture failed to take off. Later, Cage was tapped to play Batman villain Scarecrow in Joel Schumacher’s follow-up to the abysmal Batman and Robin. We all know how that turned out.
There’s plenty of other examples of actors making bizarre efforts to get cast as comic book characters. Adam West famously proposed his return to the franchise, telling the Chicago Tribune, “I would love to do Batman again. I could be kind of like Uncle Batman. The young Batman gets in terrible trouble and he finds out that his father had a brother or something, and he has to call on me.”
When auditioning for the Snyderverse’s Batman, Jason Momoa tried a different approach to the character, describing his Batman as “down and out, poor, over it, just done wrong and he wasn’t afraid to punch even good people in the face.” While this bold character choice didn’t get him the role, it did earn and influence his performance as Aquaman.
Then we have Sean Young’s extreme efforts to get the part of Catwoman in Batman Returns, going so far as to charter a jet to confront Tim Burton in his office and appear in costume on the Joan Rivers Show. It’s incredible.
But here’s what I find interesting in the collective fascination with Cage’s desire to play a character that would never be permitted to appear in a grim and gritty film franchise: It perfectly encapsulates a human behavior that’s become incredibly commonplace in the internet age.
People spend a lot of time dream-casting who they most want to see play the characters they love. They go so far as to create movie posters, trailers, fanfics, and no end of content related to this thing that will never exist.
This behavior goes so far that communities and fanbases develop a shared concept of movies that will never be made, stories that will never be told. Fans will probably never see Nicolas Cage’s Egghead on the big screen. But they all have an idea of what it would look like. This becomes a thing that doesn’t exist in any material way, but is still somehow real. It resides in some nebulous place. It’s what I’ll call “ethertainment.”
So while it’s an unfortunate reality that Egghead will remain in a lesser wing of Batman’s rogues gallery, enough people have already envisioned what it could be. And that’s just another thing to file away in the Library of Dreams.
