EXCLUSIVE: Lea Seydoux has the offer to star alongside Channing Tatum in Fox’s Rupert Wyatt-directed X-Men spinoff Gambit. This was a hotly contested job for the role of Belladonna Boudreaux aka Bella. As Deadline was first to reveal, the studio had a shortlist with Seydoux, Mad Max: Fury Road‘s Abbey Lee and Rebecca Ferguson of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation. They were set to test, and then Ferguson dropped out to take one of the leads in DreamWorks’ adaptation of The Girl On The Train.

Now, the role in Gambit will go to Seydoux, who moved from the racy Cannes sensation Blue Is The Warmest Color to the 007 film Spectre. In X-Men lore, Bella was Gambit’s love since childhood, but eventually she gained powers of her own and became head of the Assassins Guild. Gambit, aka Remy LeBeau, was head of the Thieves Guild. The French actress is repped by WME, United Agents and Agence Adequat.