Celebrity News
Matthew McConaughey, Amanda Seyfried, Matt Damon and More A-List Stars Reflect on the Roles that Got Away
Stars reflect on the movie roles that passed them by – take a look at what could have been.
John Leguizamo
Asked about his movie regrets, the 64-year-old had a few. “Oh yeah, The Devil Wears Prada, the Stanley Tucci part,” he told Business Insider about turning down the role as Anne Hathaway’s fashion-mag mentor in the 2006 movie. “Also Happy Feet, the Robin Williams part, and Mr. & Mrs. Smith, the Vince Vaughn part. I had my reasons. I mean, they’re stupid, but I had my reasons.”
Tom Selleck
In a recent conversation with fellow Blue Bloods alum Bridget Moynahan at NYC’s 92nd Street Y, the 80-year-old said he was offered the role of Indiana Jones in 1981’s Raiders of the Lost Ark but had to turn it down because he’d already signed on for Magnum, P.I.
“People told me not to go see it when it came out,” he said of the film. “They said I’d get depressed. I said, ‘No, I want to see it — kind of put it behind me.’”
Matthew McConaughey
He was almost the king of the world! “I wanted that. I auditioned with Kate Winslet,” the 55-year-old admitted of playing Jack to her Rose in the 1997 blockbuster Titanic.
“Walked away from there pretty confident that I had it. I didn’t get it. I never got offered that.”
In the end, it was Leonardo Dicaprio sinking into the icy depths.
Matt Damon
A scheduling conflict cost the 54-year-old big-time. Matt was desperate to work with James Cameron on the 2009 sci-fi epic Avatar — the highest-grossing movie of all time, earning $2.9 billion worldwide — but didn’t want to leave the set of his Jason Bourne movie early. Even an offer of 10 percent of the box office couldn’t sway him.
“I’m sure it’s the most money an actor ever turned down,” he later said, adding that pal John Krasinski once joked, “Nothing in your life would be different today if you had done that movie — except you and I would be having this conversation in space.”
Amanda Seyfried
She could have defied gravity! The 39-year-old went to great lengths to audition to play Glinda in Wicked while shooting her Emmy-nominated turn as Elizabeth Holmes in The Dropout.
“Because I wanted it that much that I was like, You know what? Yeah, I have to play the last scene of The Dropout on Tuesday. I’ll give my Sunday to you,” she said.
“I literally bent over backwards while playing the hardest role of my life.” Ariana Grande nabbed the part.
