Director Bryan Singer announced the casting of actress Lana Condor as the mutant Jubilee (a.k.a. Jubilation Lee) via Instagram, confirming the teenage mutant as one of many new additions to the franchise roster in what the filmmaker has described as the conclusion of a three-movie arc that began with 2011’s X-Men: First Class.
Condor is a newcomer to the screen, with X-Men: Apocalypse her only credited role so far. The character she’ll play in Apocalypse has appeared in all three of the original X-Men films in cameo roles, but never as a featured player in the films’ storylines.
First appearing in 1989’s Uncanny X-Men #244, Jubilee was created by writer Chris Claremont and artist Marc Silvestri. A teenage mutant with the ability to generate bright, pyrotechnic “energy plasmoids” from her hands, Jubilee became one of the lead characters in the popular X-Men animated series that ran for five seasons on FOX.
Condor joins a confirmed cast that already includes franchise actors James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, and Rose Byrne, as well as newcomers Alexandra Shipp as the mutant Storm, Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, Tye Sheridan as Cyclops, Kodi Smit-McPhee as Nightcrawler, and Oscar Isaac as the film’s villain, Apocalypse.
X-Men: Days of Future Past actor Evan Peters is also expected to reprise his role as Quicksilver.
Filming on X-Men: Apocalypse will begin next month in Montreal, with the movie scheduled to hit theaters May 27, 2016.
