Actors Who Turned Down Big Roles
These 25 Actors Passed on the Role of a Lifetime, but Most of Them Didn't Regret It
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A different iconic Tom almost starred in Jerry Maguire. Writer-director Cameron Crowe revealed to Deadline that he wrote the script with Hanks in mind.
"He liked my stuff and we had a couple conversations after Say Anything. The idea was, let's not be slaves to writing this as a Tom Hanks in capital letters movie, but let's have Tom Hanks on our minds as a guy who would play Jerry Maguire. So we were kind of developing it for him, based on us knowing he really wanted to do something with us. But as Hanks got more and more into that white hot heat of super stardom, I always did think, well, if Tom Hanks doesn't do this, who would be the dream Jerry Maguire? More and more over time, that was Tom Cruise." Ultimately, when Hanks's schedule directing That Thing You Do took him out of the running, Cruise snagged the role.