The movie Morgan Freeman didn’t believe anyone could match: “I don’t think you can beat that”
In the early 2000s, a young British director with only a few movies under his belt began pursuing Morgan Freeman to star in his fourth film. He was levelling up with this picture, working in the wonderful world of IP and commanding a much larger budget than he’d been used to. He was convinced that Freeman was perfect for one of the movie’s supporting parts, but there was one problem: Freeman didn’t feel the same.
Amazingly, though, the director successfully sold Freeman on his vision, convincing him to take on the role. Freeman ended up loving the project so much that he became certain no other incarnation of the titular character could ever rival the one he had been a part of.
When Christopher Nolan was hired to reboot Batman for Warner Brothers in January 2003, the cerebral young director was seen as a daring choice for the studio. He had only made one studio film – 2002’s Insomnia – but had wowed Hollywood with his mind-bending backwards-forwards noir Memento. His pitch was to bring Batman into the real world as much as possible while telling the origin story that Hollywood had never fully addressed, and it excited fans and studio heads in equal measure. There were still doubts about him helming a large-scale superhero blockbuster, though, so he set about stacking the deck in his favour with one of the best casts ever assembled for a cape and cowl movie.
Nolan cast the intense Christian Bale as Batman, a fan-favourite choice, and rising star Cillian Murphy, fresh off 28 Days Later, as the villainous Dr Jonathan Crane. For the supporting cast, however, he sought more established names, bringing in heavyweights like Liam Neeson, Gary Oldman, and Michael Caine. But as Nolan collaborated with David S Goyer on the script and introduced the character of Lucius Fox, he did something he typically avoided.
“I did write with Morgan Freeman in mind,” Nolan confessed during a Dark Knight Trilogy documentary. “To try to write characterisation around an actor can be limiting, and I tried not to make it limiting. I wrote a part I hadn’t seen him play before.”
Nolan then began trying to convince the legendary Seven and Shawshank Redemption star to come to Gotham City. Freeman wasn’t as quickly swayed as he may have hoped, though, and the process of wooing him took a long time. “Whatever he tells you now, he was very difficult to convince,” Nolan smiled. “I actually flew to Memphis to meet with him in person and really explain why the part needed him.”
Amazingly, Freeman was so reticent to commit to the film that Nolan half-expected him not to turn up to the shoot. However, the director got his man in the end, and Freeman lent his inimitable warmth and gravitas to the role of Batman’s technology whiz. To Nolan’s delight, Freeman wound up loving Batman Begins, the movie he’d been so reluctant to appear in. Indeed, when he was on the promotional trailer for the film and was asked if he’d seen the movie in full, he replied, “Yes, I saw it the night before last, and I was really knocked out.”
Ultimately, Freeman returned twice more to play Fox in The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, and the trilogy is one of the highlights of his incredible career. Naturally, though, considering Batman is one of the jewels in Warner Brothers’ crown, the studio was never likely to leave the character dormant for too long after the conclusion of Nolan’s trilogy. Indeed, Ben Affleck soon signed up to play the caped crusader in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and when Freeman was asked about the casting in 2016, he revealed he was pleased for his The Sum of All Fears co-star. However, he had a pretty significant caveat to that happiness.
“I don’t know how that’s gonna work,” cautioned Freeman to Entertainment Tonight. “Because the Dark Knight was almost ‘it.’ Pretty much ‘it.'”
Then, with a twinkle in his eye, he added, “Did you see Batman Begins? I don’t think you can beat that.”
