Marvel Studios president Avi Arad was in talks with Jonathan Hensleigh, screenwriter of a row of hits, including Die Hard With a Vengeance and Armageddon, to direct an updated adaptation of The Punisher. Arad knew Romijn well from the X-Men films: "I really wanted her for this movie; the attraction was to dirty her up, if you will."
For her next flick, The Punisher, Romijn returns to the world of Marvel Comics. "Marvel is a popular genre these days," she explains. "I did it because the part I play in the X-Men movies is the opposite of the part I play in The Punisher. Her name is Joan and she lives next door to the Punisher. She's sort of the love interest. She's the mousy recovering drug addict and kind of a loser. She's totally the opposite of Mystique, who is an evil badass."
Question: In "The Punisher," ' you live down the hall from this guy and he practically blows up the building, wall by wall, through the movie. Where was the apartment manager during all this? Rebecca Romijn: Good question. You never saw him. You'd think the super would show up at one point and go, "What the hell?" ' The other thing I kept wondering was how we all lived in that building for so long and no one snagged the apartment with the elevator inside. The Punisher gets it. It's cool to have an apartment with an elevator that comes through the floor.
Cast: Thomas Jane (Frank Castle aka Punisher), John Travolta (Howard Saint), Rebecca Romijn (Joan) A. Russell Andrews, Samantha Mathis, James Carpinello, Jeff Chase, Mark Collie, Russell Durham, Ben Foster, Laura Harring, Roy Scheider
