There's an art to finding the right actor for a role, and sometimes, filmmakers need
to see what they don't want before they're able to settle on what they do.
It's easy to imagine that the stars who play our favorite film characters were the first
and only people considered, but that's not always the case.
Hard as it might be to believe, these iconic roles could easily have ended up in different
hands.
Stuart Townsend as Aragorn
Everyone is familiar with Viggo Mortensen's captivating portrayal of Aragorn, the Ranger
of the North and eventual King of Gondor in The Lord of the Rings.
As great as he is, Mortensen actually scooped the role from Stuart Townsend, who spent two
months training before he was let go.
Townsend would go on to his own successes, but he didn't look back on his brush with
Middle-earth fondly, telling Entertainment Weekly,
"I did get shafted.
I was there rehearsing and training for two months, then was fired the day before filming
began."
That’s some Sauron-level treachery right there.
Sean Connery as Gandalf
Yes, Peter Jackson and his team originally intended for crotchety Sean Connery to play
Gandalf the Grey, but Connery refused.
It’s not the first big role Connery turned down, either.
Other rejected roles include Dumbledore from the Harry Potter series, John Hammond from
Jurassic Park, and Morpheus in The Matrix.
As far as The Lord of the Rings casting went, he told The New Zealand Herald,
"I never understood it.
I read the book.
I read the script.
I saw the movie.
I still don't understand it.
I would be interested in doing something that I didn't fully understand, but not for 18
months."
Luckily, we ended up with Sir Ian McKellen as the lovable wizard instead.
Will Smith as Django
The list of R-rated movies starring Will Smith is pretty short, but despite this, he was
originally written in as the hero in Django Unchained.
He didn't pass on the movie just to maintain his wholesome image, however.
Smith revealed to Entertainment Weekly that he didn’t want to play the character after
finding out that he wasn’t originally going to be playing the lead, or going to be killing
the bad guy.
After the Fresh Prince passed, Django became the lead character anyway, with Christoph
Waltz's Dr. King Schultz stepping aside for Jamie Foxx to take the spotlight.
Sorry, Will.
Robert Downey Jr. as Lt. Matthew Kowalski
When we think about Robert Downey, Jr. these days, we tend to picture his head stuck in
the Iron Man helmet.
But picture Tony Stark as Sandra Bullock's co-star in Gravity.
As he told Howard Stern, Downey passed on the role because he just couldn’t stand
the special effects rig that he was strapped into.
Coincidentally, Scarlett Johansson was also a potential candidate for Bullock's role.
We're pretty sure two Avengers could've made it back from space with no problems.
But then again, there’s only so many times we can see Downey floating helplessly in space.
Chris Farley as Shrek
Mike Myers' performance as the lovable ogre helped make Shrek an instant classic.
But prior to Myers voicing the green guy, a large portion of the film's dialogue was
recorded by Chris Farley.
“Bah!
Help!
A big, stupid, stinky, smelly, ugly ogre.
I’m so scared!”
His untimely death in 1997 derailed production, resulting in major delays.
Luckily, Shrek was able to find a suitable voice courtesy of Farley's friend and former
Saturday Night Live castmate.
Meg Ryan, Diane Lane, and Michelle Pfeiffer as Vivian Ward
Pretty Woman pretty much launched Julia Roberts' career, but she only got the role of the hooker
with a heart of gold after a bunch of bigger names passed first.
Director Garry Marshall originally had Meg Ryan lined up to play the part of Vivian Ward.
After she departed the project, Diane Lane got as far as costume fittings before dropping
out.
Michelle Pfeiffer caught Marshall's eye, but she also declined the role, leaving it in
the hands of the relatively unknown Roberts, who was just 21 at the time.
It turned out that she was the perfect person to fall in love with Richard Gere on-screen,
and sell a truckload of Roxette records along the way.
Meryl Streep as Ellen Ripley
Sigourney Weaver broke cinematic barriers of female badassery in the Alien franchise,
but the production team originally had its eye on Meryl Streep for the role of Ellen
Ripley.
The actress dropped out prior to the start of production because of the death of her
boyfriend, Godfather actor John Cazale.
Upon Streep's exit, Scott briefly turned to Veronica Cartwright to play Ripley, and then
switched things up again, giving the role to Weaver.
Cartwright was instead given the part of Chief Navigator Lambert.
Several decades and classic films later, it's obvious he made the right choice.
O.J.
Simpson as The Terminator
Surprisingly, Arnold Schwarzenegger had to juke past a football great to score the role
of the unrelenting T-800 cyborg in the 1984 sci-fi classic The Terminator.
Entertainment Weekly reported that Orion Pictures co-founder Mike Medavoy wanted O.J.
Simpson to star as the Terminator, saying,
"At the time, O.J.
Simpson had one of those commercials for Hertz where he jumped over a counter and ran to
get a rental car.
It was all of that athletic stuff, which I thought the Terminator should have.”
Medavoy was so set on having Simpson as the T-800 that he offered Schwarzenegger the role
of Kyle Reese, which would ultimately be played by Michael Biehn.
Thankfully, common sense intervened.
Or maybe it was Skynet.
Bill Murray as Batman
By the time Michael Keaton donned the Caped Crusader's cowl, another take on the character
had already spent years in development.
An earlier project simply called The Batman had stalled due to the deaths of a few potential
casting choices, and director Ivan Reitman took the reigns.
In his new version, he initially wanted Bill Murray to play Batman, with Eddie Murphy as
Robin.
When you think about Keaton's Bruce Wayne, the idea of Bill Murray in the part doesn't
seem all that far-fetched… except maybe picturing him in the Batsuit.
Eventually, Warner Bros. handed the reins to Tim Burton, who axed The Batman's script
completely and gave us the 1989 Batman we all know and love.
Everyone in Ghostbusters
Believe it or not, Paul "Pee-Wee Herman" Reubens was originally intended to play Gozer the
Gozerian at the end of Ghostbusters.
That's just one of the many ways in which the 1984 comedy-horror classic changed during
its journey to the screen.
Dan Aykroyd, who wrote the script with Meatballs and Animal House vet Harold Ramis, originally
envisioned a futuristic time-traveling adventure starring himself and fellow Blues Brother
and SNL pal John Belushi.
Understanding that the original concept would have made Ghostbusters too expensive to film,
Ramis helped reshape the story, but Belushi's untimely death in 1982 threw a wrench into
development.
The movie was eventually rewritten into the ensemble story we know and love, with Belushi
there in spirit, too.
According to director Ivan Reitman, the glowing green ghost known as Slimer was conceived
as a tribute to Belushi.
It’s not hard to tell how.
Ramis and Aykroyd also wanted John Candy to star as Louis Tully, but Candy passed on the
project.
The role eventually went to Rick Moranis.
To top things off, before Ernie Hudson joined the cast as Winston Zeddemore, Aykroyd originally
wanted his Trading Places co-star Eddie Murphy for the role.
Murphy had to pass because he was shooting Beverly Hills Cop, but that's alright, because
Ernie Hudson loves this town.
“I love this town!”
Just About Everyone as Sam Wheat
Despite the wishes of Ghost writer Bruce Joel Rubin, who wanted the role of Sam Wheat to
go to Patrick Swayze, director Jerry Zucker went through a slew of noteworthy actors to
star as the film’s dead lothario.
According to IMDb, some of the names who turned down the film's title role include Johnny
Depp, Kevin Bacon, Nicolas Cage, Kevin Costner, Tom Cruise, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Tom
Hanks, John Travolta, and Alec Baldwin.
Even Bruce Willis, who was married to Ghost star Demi Moore at the time, passed on the
project.
Eventually Zucker came around to Rubin's way of thinking, which was definitely for the
best.
We really couldn't imagine any more supernatural scenes with Nic Cage.
“I’m a vampire!
I’m a vampire!
I’m a vampire!”
Thanks for watching!
Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch more videos like the one you just saw.
And leave us a comment to let us know which alternate actors you would like to have seen
in these roles...