I Low-Key Feel Bad For These 19 Actors Who Were Straight-Up Fired From These Huge Movies And TV Shows
1.Ashton Kutcher was supposed to play Drew in Elizabethtown.
Director Cameron Crowe had always wanted Orlando Bloom, though, who wasn't available at first. Kutcher said he "wasn’t disciplined enough as an actor" in rehearsals, and as soon as Bloom became available, Kutcher and Crowe came to a "mutual agreement" that Kutcher would no longer play the part.
2.Cassie Steele, best known as Manny from Degrassi, had originally been cast to voice Raya in Raya and the Last Dragon.
Steele was replaced in the Disney film after "key changes" were made to Raya's character, meaning Steele no longer fit. "It's just one of those creative change moments," producer Osnat Shurer explained. Steele was replaced with Kelly Marie Tran.
3.Lisa Kudrow was meant to play Roz on Frasier before she played Phoebe on Friends.
Kudrow was replaced by Peri Gilpin days into filming the pilot, later saying, "I wasn't right for the part [or] for the chemistry of the group." She even felt director James Burrows didn't like her, and worried he would fire her from Friends as well when she started working on that show, which he directed episodes of.
4.Jenna Fischer was fired from Man With a Plan because people couldn't divorce her from her character from The Office.
Fischer was fired after test audiences couldn't divorce her or costar Matt LeBlanc from their famous sitcom characters, saying they didn't believe Pam and Joey would ever mesh well together. She was replaced by Liza Snyder.
5.Julianne Moore was replaced by Melissa McCarthy in Can You Ever Forgive Me?
“I think she didn’t like what I was doing,” Moore said of writer and original director Nicole Holofcener. “I think that her idea of where the character was, was different than where my idea of where the character was, and so she fired me.” She was replaced by Melissa McCarthy.
6.Colin Firth's voice was too old for Paddington.
Firth was originally supposed to voice the beloved children's character, but director Paul King later decided it was a bad fit. "As the actual visual of the character emerged, you suddenly go, ‘This is just a young, fluffy creature.’ Somehow, it just didn’t have his voice," King said. "Paddington does not have the voice of a very handsome older man." Ben Whishaw later took over the role.
7.Natalie Portman had the opposite problem in Romeo + Juliet — she was too young.
Portman was fired for being too young for the role — she was 13 at the time, the age of Juliet in Shakespeare's play, but seemed much too young alongside the 21-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio. Portman was replaced with Claire Danes, who was 17.
8.As was Stuart Townsend for the role of Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings.
Townsend was supposed to play hero Aragorn in the sprawling saga, but was replaced by Viggo Mortensen right as filming began, even though Townsend had been on location rehearsing for two months. Townsend was reportedly replaced for being too young, though he also self-admittedly was not having a good time on set.
9.Dax Shepard was meant to guest star on Will and Grace but was fired after the table read.
Shepard was supposed to play Jackson Boudreaux on the reboot of the show but was fired after "something stunk" (his own words) at the table read. The role later went to Nick Offerman.
10.One of Michael J. Fox's most iconic roles is Marty McFly from Back to the Future — but it turns out that Eric Stoltz was originally cast in the role.
Stoltz was replaced a few weeks into filming when it became clear the film needed more of a "screwball" than a serious dramatic actor. Fox was then cast in the film and its sequels.
11.Harvey Keitel also played the character in the wrong tone when he was cast as Willard in Apocalypse Now.
After a week of filming, director Francis Ford Coppola realized Keitel wasn't right for the role of Captain Willard, who was supposed to be more of an onlooker than Keitel was playing him. His role was taken over by Martin Sheen.
12.Kel O'Neill was fired from There Will Be Blood after failing to connect with the director.
Director Paul Thomas Anderson had O’Neill show up two weeks early to help him get into character for the period drama, but O’Neill said that he knew pretty quickly it wasn't working between him and Anderson. He was later fired and replaced by Paul Dano.
13.Sarah Silverman was fired from sitcom Pride and Joy after misinterpreting the ~sauciness~ of the show.
Silverman was fired from the family-friendly sitcom after she used tongue in a kissing scene, as that's what she thought they did on sitcom Happy Days. Apparently, this wasn't appropriate, and she said that the producer probably felt it was easier to replace her than correct her. She was also likely far too young for the role — Silverman admitted she looked 15 but was cast as an architect and mother. She was replaced by Julie Warner.
14.Mark Webber was allegedly fired from Stumptown after the pilot for not being attractive enough.
Webber was replaced by Jake Johnson after the pilot, claiming that it was because network executives felt he wasn't handsome enough for the role in a long social media tirade.
15.Former teen heartthrob Freddie Prinze Jr. was also fired from the CW series Nancy Drew after the pilot.
Similarly, Prinze Jr., who played Drew's father in the pilot, was replaced after producers decided to "go in a different direction." His part would end up being played by Scott Wolf.
16.Jean Claude Van Damme left Predator after difficulties involving his costume.
Van Damme was cast as the Predator because of the way he moved — but the costume made it very difficult for him to move in the same way. He also was very uncomfortable in the costume, and felt unsafe performing some of the stunts, which he claims led to him being replaced. However, there are other different accounts for why Van Damme was fired, including that producers just wanted to go with a bigger actor. He was replaced by Kevin Peter Hall.
17.Dennis Hopper was fired after only days of filming for The Truman Show.
Hopper was replaced after only two days. Producter Scott Rudin apparently didn't want him in the role and had made a deal with director Peter Weir that if he was still unhappy with Hopper after the first day, they'd fire him. That ended up coming to pass, and Hopper was replaced by Ed Harris.
18.Gerard McSorley was replaced after filming started for the Oscar-winning film The Departed.
The Irish actor was replaced by Martin Sheen, himself admitting he may have been overly focused on promoting his last film, which affected his preparation for the role in the Scorsese film. He also seemed to have different ideas about the character from what we saw in the finished product, believing Queenan should be a former Northern Ireland police officer.
19.And finally, Phil Burns was recast after the first season of Seinfeld.
Burns played Jerry's father in season 1 of the hit show but was recast for season 2. In a DVD featurette, director Tom Cherones reveals Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld wanted Jerry to have a harsher parent, and Burns wasn't the right fit anymore. They cast Barney Martin instead.