Batman Returns’ Danny DeVito Would Play Penguin Again on Just One Condition

Summary

• Danny DeVito would gladly reprise his role as the Penguin in a
  Batman
  film if Tim Burton directed it.
• Fans also want Michael Keaton to come back as Batman/Bruce Wayne after his show-stealing appearance at the 96th Academy Awards.
• The banter between Batman alums DeVito, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Keaton at this year’s Oscars proved to be one of the more memorable moments from the awards ceremony.

It’s quite simple, really. If Tim Burton decided to direct another Batman film that featured the Penguin, aka Oswald Cobblepot, then Danny DeVito would reprise the villainous role he brought to life on the big screen over 30 years ago. DeVito portrayed the iconic Dark Knight baddie only one time and that was in 1992’s Batman Returns. And DeVito revealed in an exclusive interview, while discussing the upcoming one-night performance of Matilda in Concert, Burton is the key to his return as the Penguin. DeVito told Screen Rant:

If Tim Burton was directing it, I’d be there in a second. Oswald Cobblepot is my favorite. I had a good time. Its operatic. I like every once in a while going big [laughs], and so I’d do that in a second. We had a ball doing that.

Burton directed both Batman (1989) and Batman Returns (1992), but he handed over the reins to the late Joel Schumacher, who sat in the director’s chair for both follow-ups: Batman Forever (1995) and the critically maligned Batman & Robin (1997). And while DeVito would play the character again, if Burton was involved, there’s that tiny issue of the Penguin’s death at the hands of Michael Keaton’s version of the Dark Knight. But that’s what the multiverse, or in DC’s case, Elseworlds is for.

Holy Resurgence in Burton-Era Batman!

AMPAS
ABC

While Danny DeVito admits he’d return to play the Penguin for director Tim Burton, fans are clamoring for Michael Keaton’s Batman again. Keaton played Bruce Wayne/Batman for the third time on the big screen in The Flash, and the reaction for more of his version of the Dark Knight comes after DeVito and fellow Burton-era Batman alum Arnold Schwarzenegger presented together at the 96th Academy Awards.

Schwarzenegger, who portrayed Mr. Freeze in Batman & Robin, and DeVito called out Keaton in the Oscar crowd for defeating their two villainous characters back in the 1990s. Technically, George Clooney’s Batman — who also showed up in 2023’s The Flash along with Keaton — dispatched Freeze, but the three actors’ banter clearly stole the show at the awards ceremony.

Related: Michael Keaton’s Batman Gets Hilarious Oscar Roasting from Schwarzenegger and DeVito

In fact, during a recent interview on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Keaton admitted he’s even open to playing Batman again. And after returning to the play the character, or at least a multiverse version of Bruce Wayne/Batman, again in The Flash, Keaton’s living proof that there’s plenty of room in the confines of DC Elseworlds for DeVito’s Penguin to reappear. Your move, Tim Burton.

Both Tim Burton’s
Batman
and
Batman Returns
are available to stream on Max, at the time of this writing. And the New Jersey Symphony’s one-night presentation of
Matilda in Concert
, featuring Danny DeVito as the narrator, hits the stage on Friday, March 22 at 7:30 p.m. EDT. For more information and tickets, please visit the
State Theatre New Jersey website.

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