“What a load of bollocks”: the Oscar-winning movie Daniel Craig refused to audition for
Even though it’s objectively true, at least in a mainstream sense, Daniel Craig would prefer if people didn’t refer to Layer Cake and Casino Royale as his two breakthrough roles, which makes sense.
After all, the actor made his screen debut in 1992, so he was almost a decade and a half into his career before Matthew Vaughn’s crime thriller and Martin Campbell’s James Bond reboot elevated him to international stardom, so he was hardly a fresh-faced newcomer that nobody had heard of before.
On the other hand, not many of his previous roles stood out as particularly memorable, especially those in American films. He was quietly solid in Sam Mendes’ Road to Perdition, but the less said about Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, the better, and those are Craig’s words, not ours.
There’s also the fact that he was 36 when Layer Cake was released in cinemas, 37 when he was officially announced as Pierce Brosnan’s 007 replacement, and 38 when his debut as cinema’s most iconic secret agent revitalised the franchise, which meant that, in acting terms, he was no spring chicken.
However, had he not dismissed it without a second thought, he could have reached that position several years sooner than he did. With the benefit of hindsight, the star admitted that he was wrong to not even bother his arse to pitch himself for what was ultimately an Academy Award-nominated role in a movie that won five Oscars, including ‘Best Picture’.
“A friend suggested I contact Ridley Scott to play the part in Gladiator that went to Joaquin Phoenix,” he confessed to GQ. “I thought, ‘Nah, what a load of bollocks’. I should have known that Ridley would create the benchmark for that kind of movie!”
Jude Law did bother his arse to audition, but he didn’t get it. Phoenix got the part, and then he tried to quit until Scott talked him down from the ledge. The actor deserved an Oscar nod for his standout turn as Commodus, and he was so good that it’s hard to imagine anyone else inhabiting the character, and even harder to envision Craig bringing those snide, snivelly, and conniving qualities to the silver screen.
That’s not to say that he couldn’t, or that the villain of the piece would even be presented the same way were he played by another actor, although you can definitely see Law giving a performance that’s similar to Phoenix’s, based on how many pitiful and manipulative men he’s played over the years.
If anything, he’d make a better Maximus than Commodus, but he didn’t even get that far. Craig laughed off the suggestion that he get in touch about Gladiator, only to end up sitting back, watching from afar, and regretting that he could have been in one of the early 21st century’s most influential blockbusters.
