3) Russell Crowe (Wolverine)
You might know that, before Hugh Jackman landed the role which made him a pop culture icon, Scottish actor Dougray Scott was originally cast in X-Men – before he left the movie to star in Mission: Impossible II. What you might not know is that Jackman was still not the second choice: that honour went to Gladiator star Russell Crowe.
We don’t have a lot of information on why Crowe turned the part down, but it might have something to do with his strange request for the role: apparently, he agreed to play Wolverine, but only if he could play him bald. Exactly why the actor so desperately wanted to portray the character with no hair we’ll likely never know.
Interestingly, Hugh Jackman later publicly thanked Crowe for recommending him, when he pulled himself out of the running.
2) Tom Cruise (Iron Man)
Just like we couldn’t imagine anyone else but Hugh Jackman playing Wolverine, Robert Downey Jr. just is Iron Man. Things could have turned out very differently, though, as he only landed the part back in the 2008 film after Tom Cruise passed up the opportunity.
The Mission: Impossible star’s connection to Tony Stark had actually gone back a whole decade. In 1998, Cruise was attached to star and produce an Iron Man movie – and Quentin Tarantino of all people was approached to direct. The project was continually reshuffled over the years and eventually, Cruise took himself out of the running.
Here’s what he had to say about the decision at the time:
“I don’t know. It just … they came to me at a certain point and … when I do something, I wanna do it right. If I commit to something, it has to be done in a way that I know it’s gonna be something special. And as it was lining up, it just didn’t feel to me like it was gonna work.”
