Janelle Monáe Has Talked To A Marvel Director About Playing X-Men Favorite Storm

Janelle Monáe is best known as a Grammy-nominated musician, but she’s built up an impressive filmography, too, including roles in Best Picture winner Moonlight, Hidden Figures, and Harriet. Occasionally, the world collide. It was while recording Dirty Computer (one of the best albums of 2018) in Atlanta that she invited Chadwick Boseman, Lupita Nyong’o, and Michael B. Jordan, who were in town filming Black Panther, into her recording studio, and when she met director Ryan Coogler. When asked by Empire whether she’s discussed joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe with the filmmaker, Monáe not only said “yes, obviously, of course” (or something along those lines) but even offered which character she’d want to play.

“I definitely have thrown it out there,” she said. “One of my dreams has always been to play Storm. I don’t know if she comes in Black Panther, but it would be a dream to have her in it. I don’t know where they are with that. A lot of women have played Storm and they’ve done an exceptional job, and I would love to be in that line of artists and get to do Storm justice.” X-Men fan favorite Storm has been played by Halle Berry and Alexandra Shipp in the 20th Century Fox movies, although now that Disney owns the studio, she, and the rest of her mutant superheroes, are welcome to appear in the MCU.

Monáe’s next movie, Antebellum, is scheduled to come out on August 21, while Coogler is at work at Black Panther 2 (and Space Jam 2), due out May 6, 2022.