10 Actors Who Turned Down Iconic Roles For Stupid Reasons

Not a smart move.

[joshsimpson]

I can just imagine Sean Connery playing Gandolf. YOU SHALL NOT PASH!!!

[ang]

Not understanding the character is never a stupid reason to turn down roles.

[pyrosplicer]

One issue with this list is that you are assuming these iconic roles would still be iconic if a different actor had portrayed the character.


Chances are that it was the actor that made the character iconic rather than the role itself being iconic.

[Dilligff]

I wouldn't say all of these reasons were 'stupid'. Christina Applegate, after a 10 year stint playing a ditsy blonde and having her first major big screen performance being something similar probably WOULD have typecast her for future projects. Tim Roth, who was more used to smaller self contained films just didn't want to lock himself down for a 7 year contract and didn't want the extra attention it would entail. As far a Purefoy and the mask, those thing can get incredibly uncomfortable under studio lighting and unlike a prosthetic fitted to the face they are extremely difficult to see through, meaning lots of mistakes and lots of retakes if a mark is missed. Ironically, Weaving who took his place would later go on to do Red Skull, and after that shoot he refused to reprise the role for similar reasons.

[DavidJCane]

6:00 "And though the Bond icon is said to be worth north of $100 million regardless..." Are you not aware that Sean Connery died in 2020.

[ShannonGrover]

Jamie Foxx was by FAR better at the role of Django than Will Smith would have been. That was a good choice there.

[DrDiscourse]

Russel Crowe suggested Hugh Jackman for the role. Win win I would say.

[taylorlibby]

Actually I appreciate actors who have enough self-knowledge to understand what parts wouldn't be a good fit for them.

[SilverSpectre]

I mean another big difference betwen Shawshank and Mummy is that Frank retained creative control. Cruise took the reigns in the Mummy and complete rewrote everything. He turned himself into the star when his character was originally just supposed to help build up the Mummy itself for the Dark Universe

[Dopecheetah]

Will Smith was tripping yo. Django was the lead, the most important character, the film title and made it out alive at the end. Shultz was the best part of that movie though.

[ArcherSuh]

Tom Cruise also turned down the lead role in Brazil because he refused to do a videotaped audition (which Terry Gilliam required because of the film's highly visual nature) because he was worried the footage would be used to humiliate him later on...
But I guess that isn't so much a stupid reason as it is a paranoid one.

[yolman]

Olivia Munn's case is hilarious. At the end Vanessa was a better character. And at the end she was more eye candy than Morena

[Maidenjefe]

Well, in defence of Will Smith…he had already conquered the western genre with his work as the lead in that instant classic Wild Wild West…

And imagine how terrible Shawshank would’ve been had Tom Cruise starred as Andy Dufresne…

[rmooreg]

That sounds like Will Smith, needing to be the center of the universe in all his role. After his Academy Awards antics, we'll see how that's going to work out.

[Nathan.]

Glad Will Smith never played Django. Jamie Fox was perfect. As much as i like Tom Cruise, Shawshank would have been forgettable with Tom as the lead. Tim Robbins owned that role.

[KidCharlemagne.]

Turning down a role so you dont have to kiss Kevin Spacey has to be one of the best reasons to turn down a role

[taylorlibby]

I can understand what Crowe was trying to say, and it's not really stupid at all. Both characters have a similar edge of wildness and savagery about them, and good actors hate to repeat character types too quickly. Anyway it all ended up for the best.

[amai_zing]

The real reason why Cruise turned down Shawshank? No sprinting scene 😂

[draygoon]

Personally for a couple of these I want to know what the casting people were thinking to even offer the role. The main one, Sean Connery. Whoever thought he would have been good for those roles didn't understand the script either.

[metalbrock]

If Tarantino or Nolan call you for a part in their movies, just say yes. You don’t even need to see the script, the answer should always be yes