As Marvel and Disney embark on what they hope will be a mutually beneficial partnership with China for Iron Man 3, one of the biggest inroads they made was in securing Andy Lau(House of Flying Daggers) for a major supporting role in the film. Lau is one of China's biggest and most prolific stars, but he doesn't have much of an American profile, so this would have been a major step for him into Hollywood. In recent weeks as other Chinese names have been bandied about to join the cast, any mention of Lau has been scarce, and now we see why. JoBlo reports that Lau has departed the production in order to spend more time with his newborn daughter. Can't fault the guy for that.
So that leaves a pretty sizable gap left to be filled, as Lau was going to play an old friend and scientist to Tony Stark who provides him with advanced technology to help defeat Aldrich Killian and his Extremis nanobot technology. The search is now on for a male Chinese actor around 40 years of age with strong English speaking skills, and contenders are already starting to surface with Chen Daoming(Hero) and Wu Xiubo(Before the Dawn) at the top of the list.
This is pretty disappointing, and they'll be hard pressed to find an actor of Lau's stature for the part. Neither Daoming or Xiubo quite measure up in that regard. Shane Black is currently leading Iron Man 3's production, with the film set to release on May 3rd 2013.
