Much like all big-name Hollywood stars, Russell Crowe isn’t known for putting himself forward for an audition – nor is he known for reading for a part. Something Rob Liefeld discovered far too late.
During an exhaustive interview with Collider (h/t Screen Rant), the comic book scribe admitted that he found himself in hot water after trying to court Russell Crowe for the part of Nathan Summers/Cable, the villainous rogue who would ultimately be played by Josh Brolin of Avengers: Infinity War.
Prior to Brolin climbing aboard, though, Liefeld hoped Deadpool 2 would cast Russell Crowe, and even mentioned the Aussie actor on Twitter in an attempt to alert him to Fox’s forthcoming sequel. However, Crowe was aghast – maybe even a little insulted – at the thought of reading for a part, something which led to a pretty intense phone call from Fox’s bigwigs, as Rob Liefeld tells Collider:
Then one night before I went to bed, I didn’t know Russell Crowe was on Twitter, and I stupidly tweeted to Russell Crowe – not ever thinking he’d answer me – and I go ‘Hey Russell, you should read for Cable!’ That didn’t turn out very well, I got yelled at a lot, because I woke up – because he’s in Australia – to Russell Crowe saying ‘Read for it?!’ And my manager said ‘Yeah, Russell Crowe doesn’t read for parts Rob, you kind of insulted him. I’m like ‘I’m sorry! They just haven’t picked Cable yet so I’m just putting it out there.’ And then my phone rings, so some Fox people may or may not have yelled at me for an hour.
Liefeld likely received a slap on the wrists from Fox executives, while the role of Cable ultimately went to Brolin. He wasn’t entirely happy with his Deadpool 2 performance, though, and recently vowed to take things up a gear in time for X-Force.
Exactly when Drew Goddard plans to unleash his mutant team-up movie remains to be seen, but with Bad Times at the El Royale scheduled for October, we imagine it’s only a matter of months before the Merc is back in front of the cameras.
