Matthew Vaughn says turning down X-Men: Days of Future Past was one of the 'craziest' decisions of his life, but he really wanted to helm Kingsman: The Secret Service.
Matthew Vaughn
Vaughn was already working on Days of Future Past - which would have been his second X-Men movie after the success of First Class - when the scrip for Kingsman: The Secret Service.
Kingsman: The Secret Service is based on the comic book by Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons, and was a film project that Vaughn just couldn't turn down.
Speaking to IGN, the director said: "Then I was working on Days of Future Past, and I'd finished the treatment. Then the [Kingsman] script fell out of me - just one of those things.
"I remember Fox going, 'What are you talking about?' because the two scripts came in at the same time. I was like, 'Aw, s**t'. It was a really tough decision whether to do Days of Future Past or do this.
"But then I was like, 'F**k, somebody else is going to wake up and do a fun spy movie. Then I will have written a bloody screenplay that no one will want to make'.
"So I probably made the craziest decision of my life to turn down an $800 million gorilla to do Kingsman. But Kingsman's more me anyway."
The movie follows a veteran secret agent who takes a youngster under his wing and trains him to follow in his footsteps.
Colin Firth, Michael Caine, Samuel L. Jackson, Mark Strong, Mark Hamill, and Jack Davenport are all on board, while we are introduced to the acting talents of Taron Egerton.
This will be the first directorial outing for Vaughn since X-Men: First Class, and just the fifth film of his directing career to date.
Kingsman: The Secret Service is released 12th February 2015.
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