Christopher Nolan and Robert Downey Jr. made headlines when Downey revealed their first meeting in the early 2000s to potentially cast him as Scarecrow in his Batman Begins. Nolan, however, admitted in a recent interview with Downey for The New York Times that he never considered him for the role, which eventually went to Cillian Murphy. Nolan confessed, “I 100% knew you weren’t the guy for Scarecrow. In my head that was already cast. But I always wanted to meet you … I was a huge admirer of yours and therefore selfishly just wanted to take the meeting.”
“But I was also a little afraid of you, you know. I had heard all kinds of stories about how you were crazy,” he added.
This meeting predated Downey’s iconic role as Iron Man, which revived his career after a series of legal troubles in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Downey faced several arrests, including one in 1996 for possession of heroin, cocaine, and an unloaded gun, leading to three years of probation, reports Variety. He was also reportedly jailed for nearly four months in 1997 for skipping a court-ordered drug test, and again in 1999 for three years, serving 15 months before being arrested once more for drug possession four months after his release.
Marvel Studios initially hesitated to cast Downey as Tony Stark due to his troubled history. David Maisel, the former president of Marvel Studios, supported Downey for the role, despite resistance from the board. Maisel recalled, “My board thought I was crazy to put the future of the company in the hands of an addict. I helped them understand how great he was for the role. We all had confidence that he was clean and would stay clean,” reports Variety.
Talking about this specific role of the actor, Nolan, earlier this month during an interview with The New York Times said, “It one of the most consequential casting decisions that’s ever been made in the history of the movie business.”
Nolan eventually cast Downey as Lewis Strauss in Oppenheimer, along with Cillian Murphy as the titular character and Emily Blunt as Oppenheimer’s wife.
His role in the acclaimed film has already earned Downey the Best Supporting Actor prizes from the Critics’ Choice Awards and Golden Globes, making him a frontrunner for the Oscars too.
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