Xavier Woods Picks WWE Star He'd Like To See Play Batman

Xavier Woods has taken it upon himself to play casting director for another reboot of the "Batman" franchise, and he tapped into wrestling talent to populate the heroes and villains of Gotham City.

Woods used his Twitter page to highlight how he would populate a new "Batman" film.

"Batman: Montez Ford," he tweeted. "The villains in that movie — Two-Face: Me. Ra's al Ghul: Kofi Kingston. Mr. Freeze: Big E."

Ford is half of The Street Profits tag-team, although Woods seemingly had no role in mind for Ford's partner, Angelo Dawkins. Ford has never acted in a film, while Woods appeared with his New Day wrestling collaborators Kingston and Big E alongside The Undertaker in the 2021 half-hour Netflix romp "Escape the Undertaker."

Woods' vision of a Batman film is particularly distinctive because the major roles have all been assigned to Black wrestlers. Very few Black performers have starred in the "Batman" franchise, with the few exceptions including Eartha Kitt's Catwoman in three episodes of the third season of the 1960s TV series "Batman," Halle Berry's title role in the dubiously canonical 2004 film "Catwoman," and Billy Dee Williams as the voice of Two-Face in the 2014 animated feature "The Lego Batman Movie." Williams also played a non-villainous Harvey Dent in the 1989 "Batman" feature film, but was replaced by Tommy Lee Jones when the character morphed into Two-Face for the 1995 sequel "Batman Forever."  

Some of Woods' Twitter followers served up their own casting ideas, including suggestions for Paul Heyman as the Penguin, Bianca Belair as Catwoman, Braun Strowman as Bane, and John Cena as Commissioner Gordon.