Jon Favreau Talks ‘Iron Man 2’ Cut Love Scene

One of the subplots sacrificed in “Iron Man 2” was the budding romance between Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow). In fact, the film should have opened with a love scene between the two, director Jon Favreau reveals just now.

When the film came out in theaters last year, fans noticed that one scene shown in the trailer was not shown in the final release, where the two would lock lips.

This was the first confirmation that the movie studio decided against going further with the romantic subplot – and Favreau now offers even more, the Huffington Post informs.

Apparently, there should have been a love scene right at the beginning of the film, but it was nixed in the editing room.

“We wanted to open up ‘Iron Man 2’ with Tony waking up, looking over, seeing that he’s laying next to Pepper Potts and that they’d just slept together, and just being really freaked out, like, what’s he going to do?” Favreau says.

This opening – and another one they’d shot, which also featured the two but in a less romantic situation, with a hungover Tony puking in the back of a truck as Pepper looked on – didn’t suit what the movie studio had in mind for its tentpole movie.

“Although we had a lot of creative freedom, there was all of a sudden, there was something to protect and the studio was already very well established, there was an ‘Avengers’ agenda, there was a Tony Stark agenda, and there were all these other movies that were being developed,” Favreau explains.

In other words, the love story fell into the background – and then out of the picture altogether.

No word yet whether it will ever be reintroduced again. Favreau certainly can’t offer any pointers on this, since he’s no longer involved with the “Iron Man” franchise, whose next installment is now in production in other (well-qualified) hands.

As we also informed you a while back, Shane Black is handling the script and will direct. The third film comes out in May 2013.