The actor who regretted turning down an Oscar-winning Martin Scorsese role: “Why should I see his little film?”
There are more difficult ways to win an Oscar than starring in a Martin Scorsese movie, with the legendary director steering several of his cast members toward Academy Awards glory.
Raging Bull‘s Robert De Niro, Goodfellas‘ Joe Pesci, The Aviator‘s Cate Blanchett, and The Color of Money‘s Paul Newman all claimed a shiny prize for delivering some of the best work of their impressive careers under the watch of an all-time great auteur firing on every possible cylinder.
Then there are the nominations acquired by Gangs of New York‘s Daniel Day-Lewis, Cape Fear‘s Juliette Lewis, Taxi Driver‘s Jodie Foster, and The Age of Innocence‘s Winona Ryder, to name just a few, with Scorsese so good at his job that he can turn Mark fucking Wahlberg into an Oscar-nominated performer.
He’s one of the best actors’ directors that Hollywood has ever seen, with almost 30 performances having been shortlisted on his watch, but it took a few features before he became the Martin Scorsese that everyone has known and loved for so long, with one star refusing to work with him because they barely knew who he was.
In their defence, they were a much bigger deal at the time than he was. In the early 1970s, the filmmaker had only recently put himself on the map with Mean Streets, and while it was clear that he was a ferociously gifted talent behind the camera, it was still only his third feature-length undertaking, and the one before that was a Roger Corman cheapie, Boxcar Bertha.
Meanwhile, Shirley MacLaine had three Oscar nominations for ‘Best Actress’, and had a pair of Baftas, four Golden Globes, and starring roles in titles like The Apartment, Ocean’s 11, Gambit, Two Mules for Sister Sara, and many more under her belt. When Scorsese offered her the lead in his fourth flick, she made a decision that would haunt her for the rest of her days.
“I regret turning down the lead role in Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, which Ellen Burstyn deservedly won an Oscar for,” she lamented to The New York Times when asked to name the biggest professional mistake she ever made. “I said to myself, ‘Who is this Martin Scorsese person? Why should I see his little film about mean streets?'”
Scorsese had been hired to direct his first major studio production, but as a proven star, Burstyn still had approval of the director. Warner Bros gave her the pick of the scripts, but it was Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore that caught her eye, and after suggesting that someone “who was new, exciting, and unknown” would be ideal to take the reins, Francis Ford Coppola insisted that she watch Mean Streets.
She told the studio that she’d play the role with Scorsese at the wheel, leaving MacLaine on the outside looking in. One ‘Best Actress’ win later, the director had followed up Mean Streets with an award-winning box office hit backed by one of the industry’s most powerful entities, and his career was well and truly off to the races.
