Guy Pearce Initially Turned Down IRON MAN 3 Role
His reason is not at all surprising and one that is now expected of Marvel Studios, but Guy Pearce revealed during a recent interview that he almost turned down his Iron Man 3 role as Aldrich Killian.
Guy Pearce recently explained to Total Film magazine that he previously "fought to keep away from the bigger films," including roles in Daredevil and Batman Begins, because he foresaw "corners getting cut off" and/or he just wasn't taken by the project offered. Obviously, the English-Australian actor made an exception for Marvel's Iron Man 3, and admits it was "very much" fun to play the villain Aldrich Killian, but the Shane Black-directed actioner was almost another film he passed on.
"My agent was certainly very excited by the prospect of Iron Man 3, and I knew it would be seen by a lot more people [than my previous films did]," said Guy Pearce, when asked why he was intrigued by the Marvel film... at first. "But for me, it was just a case of going, 'Well, this will be fun. I like Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow and I like what they did before." He continued, "When I watched the first one, I thought, 'Wow, there's something different here.' Shane [Black], who directed the third, had been a fan of mine, apparently. He called up and I had a meeting with him and he said, 'We're not allowed to give you the script but I can tell you all about it.' He ran me through the whole story over lunch. It sounded really interesting. But I did end up saying to my agent, 'I'm not going to do this movie until they show me the script.' And my agent went [sharp intake of breath], 'They really don't want to show you the script.' So I said I wasn't going to do it. They sent me the script via link. You have two hours to read it before your computer blows up! And it was fine - it was exactly what we'd talked about." So, over a year after the film was released, what does Guy Pearce think of Iron Man 3 now? "It's even better than I thought it was going to be; I think it's a great movie," he answered. Coincidentally, it was revealed recently that Mark Ruffalo almost turned down The Avengers also because Marvel wasn't willing to show him the script before signing on. What do you think?