One thing that can never be denied about actors is how passionate they can get about the projects that they commit to. It is rare to see an actor view their work as merely a job. With a job, someone may only commit to a role or assignment because it pays well, but with all of the hard work and commitment it takes to be an actor, those in the field are usually picky about what paydays they say yes to.
That is partly why so many actors have turned down large sums of money for some of the biggest roles that Hollywood has ever had to offer. It would be easy to say yes to playing a life-changing, incredibly sought-after character, but when there are bigger things at stake than money, actors have declined.
10 Leonardo DiCaprio Turned Down $21 Million For American Psycho
Initially, during early pre-production, director Mary Harron and star Christian Bale were brought in, but after Lionsgate acquired worldwide distribution, they temporarily replaced them respectively with Oliver Stone and Leonardo DiCaprio, hoping to bank on the bigger stars of the era. Upon their inclusion, the studio wanted to balloon the budget to $40 million in order to pay Leo $21 million.
However, because DiCaprio was still enjoying his popularity as a teen idol, Gloria Steinem took him to a Yankee game to convince him against participating, highlighting that after he finished Titanic, "there is an entire planet full of 13-year-old girls waiting to see what you do next, and this is going to be a movie that has horrible violence toward women," per IndieWire. Shortly after, Leo was out and both Harron and Bale were back onboard.
9 John Travolta Would Rather Do Pulp Fiction Than Get $70 Million For Forrest Gump
1994 is often hailed as the greatest year in movie history. Several celebrated classics came out that year, including fan favorites Forrest Gump and Pulp Fiction, which are a lot more closely linked together than some readers may think.
Pulp Fiction stars John Travolta, but prior to joining the cast, Travolta was asked to star in the title role of Forrest Gump. He turned down the offer because the script for Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction fell on his table. From there, Tom Hanks came into the picture. One day, Hanks walked onto the set with a box of chocolates, and the next, he walked away with an estimated $70 million, plus additional box office profits, plus an Oscar for Best Actor, an award which Travolta's performance in Pulp Fiction was also nominated for.
8 Matt Damon Turned Down Lead Role In Avatar & A 10% Stake
Avatar changed then-unknown actor Sam Worthington's life for the better when he was cast in the lead role as Jake Sully, but he almost missed out on the part to a bigger named actor. Matt Damon was originally offered the part of Jake by James Cameron, who Damon recalls to GQ told him, "I don’t need a name for this, a named actor. If you don’t take this, I’m going to find an unknown actor and give it to him, because the movie doesn’t really need you. But if you take the part, I’ll give you 10% of [the Avatar profits]."
Meaning that had he taken the role, Damon would have received at least $250 million. He turned it down due to a scheduling conflict with another movie he was filming at the time, Green Zone.
7 Will Smith Missed Out On $35 Million For The Matrix
One of the more infamous instances of an actor turning down a major role was when Will Smith was offered the lead role of Neo for The Matrix. As he's explained time and time again, Smith just didn't see the vision that The Wachowskis had for the movie. In fact, in retrospect, Smith believes he would have messed it up had he joined the cast.
One thing Smith has never talked about is how much money he missed out on. By playing Neo in the first Matrix alone, Keanu Reeves garnered $10 million off of an upfront salary, not to mention total earnings of $35 million after receiving a backend of the movie's box office profits.
6 Sean Connery Wouldn't Travel To Play Gandalf For $30 Million
A big reason why Ian McKellen currently holds a net worth of $60 million is that he joined the X-Men and Lord of the Rings franchises relatively around the same time, solidifying him as a mega-star. In the case of the latter, as much as he's become synonymous with the role of Gandalf and the franchise as a whole, he wasn't the director's first choice.
Peter Jackson's first choice was the late Sean Connery, who turned down the role because he didn't want to travel from the US to New Zealand. He also admitted in interviews that he just didn't understand the material. Jackson and Co. wanted Connery so badly that they offered not only $30 million upfront, but 15% of the box office earnings. He still declined.
5 Russell Crowe Skipped $100 Million To Play Aragorn
Ian McKellen was not the only big-name actor to turn down a role in one of the highest-grossing movie franchises in Hollywood history. Before Viggo Mortensen was cast as Aragorn in the original trilogy, the part was offered to Russell Crowe off the heels of his breakout success in Gladiator.
As he explained in an interview with Howard Stern, Crowe turned it down because he never got the impression that director Peter Jackson actually wanted him in his movies. If anything, he thought Jackson spoke to him out of obligation because coming out of Gladiator's success, every studio was offering him a big franchise role. Had Crowe accepted the part, he was also accepting a 10% backend pay, which altogether would've amounted to a $100 million paycheck.
4 Keanu Reeves Dodged A Bullet Turning Down Speed 2 For $12 Million
Another classic movie that came out of the year 1994 was Speed. Not only was the movie a box office smash hit, but the movie was surprisingly universally praised by critics for an action movie of that era, to the point it even won two Oscars (albeit in technical sound categories).
The movie had all the right makings of a sequel, but couldn't bring back its main star Keanu Reeves. As Reeves has explained in the past, it was for two reasons. One reason is that he was busy with other projects at the time, like playing Hamlet on stage and filming The Devil's Advocate with Al Pacino for the big screen. The other reason was, well, frankly, he thought the script sucked. Judging by Speed 2's 4% on Rotten Tomatoes, it looks like he was right.
3 Josh Hartnett Thought It Was Too Risky To Be JJ Abrams' Superman
Back when he was still Hollywood's new, young 'it' factor coming off of huge successes like Black Hawk Down, Josh Hartnett had a lot of big offers on his table. One of his biggest was to play Superman for a new trilogy—best known in development as Superman: Flyby—that would have been written by JJ Abrams. The exact amount is unclear, but given the character is still one of Warner Bros. biggest properties, it's safe to say Hartnett would have made several millions of dollars across the trilogy.
However, not one to let money drive his motivations to act in anything, Hartnett thought a project this big was too risky. Maybe it was a risk, considered Abrams left production and the project turned into the flop that was Superman Returns, starring Brandon Routh in the red and blue tights.
2 Josh Hartnett Does Regret Not Playing Batman For $45 Million
While it is unknown exactly how much Hartnett was offered to play Superman in a proposed trilogy, it is known that Christian Bale made around $45 million for playing Batman in Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy. The reason why that is relevant is that before Bale was a lock, Hartnett was offered the part.
Josh Hartnett has the distinction of being one of the few—perhaps only—actors to turn down big-screen roles as both of the DC World's Finest. In the case of Batman, he turned it down because he was burnt out from his hot streak of blockbuster Hollywood movies and wanted to take a break to spend it with friends and family. However, in the years since, Hartnett does admit not taking the role is his only regret as an actor.
1 Michael Keaton Could've Played Batman Again For $15 Million
Playing Beetlejuice and Batman back to back helped launch Michael Keaton into superstardom. He liked playing the latter enough that he returned (so to speak) for the second round in Batman Returns, but what stopped him from returning for the third time was Tim Burton's exit from the director's chair.
The studio essentially fired Burton on grounds that the sequel got too dark and they wanted to make a more family-friendly second sequel upon some not-so-family-friendly controversy from parents. The studio was on board to bring Keaton back, but since Keaton liked the dark tone and wasn't a fan of the upcoming comedic shift in direction due for Batman Forever, he walked out the exit room behind Burton, turning down $15 million in the process.
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