Olivia Wilde Had to Lie to Friends 'by Omission' for Weeks About Netting Rumored Spider-Woman Gig
Kevin Winter/Getty Olivia Wilde
Olivia Wilde's best kept secret of 2020? Her directing gig for an upcoming superhero film, rumored to be Spider-Woman.
The actress, 36, appeared on the latest episode of Evan Ross Katz's podcast Shut Up Evan on Tuesday in which she spoke about the challenge of keeping her new job under wraps for weeks.
"I have a lot of texts from friends that are like 'Are you f—ing kidding me? I've seen you like seventeen times in the past month. You were just lying the whole time?' And I'm like 'It was lying by omission. I couldn't,'" Wilde said. "It's really intense because you know what people care about? They care about superhero movies."
She continued, "That's what I said to Jason [Sudeikis] the night it came out. I walked into the kitchen and I was like, 'I know what people care about.' If we can get people to care about the 2020 election as much as they care about superhero movies we will be in good shape."
RELATED: Olivia Wilde to Direct and Write a Female-Centered Superhero Film
Wilde said the film "is by far the most exciting thing that has ever happened to me."
Marvel
The actress and director, who previously helmed 2019's critically acclaimed comedy Booksmart, said she is grateful to also be developing a superhero film.
"Not only do I get to tell this story as a director, but I get to develop this story, and that was what made it so incredible for me," she said. "I'm just honored to be amongst this wave of women who are showing up and saying 'we are not going to step in and try and tell this story like men do, we're actually going to reframe the stories themselves.'"
She added, "And the industry is, as far as I can tell, really supportive of that. There is a sea change and it's because of the decades of trailblazers who demanded this over and over and over again and it's finally broken through and I'm very fortunate to be there with it."
News of Wilde’s rumored Spider-Woman broke in August. Wilde will co-write the film alongside Katie Silberman (Set It Up) for Sony, a source confirmed to PEOPLE at the time.
The character of Spider-Woman has been the alter ego of quite a few characters in the comic books including Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane Watson and Jessica Drew, the first character to wear the suit in the 1970s.
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