Avatar is well on its way to being one of the biggest movies of all time, and it’s doing it without major A-list star power. Instead the movie’s leading roles are played by up and comers in Zoe Saldana and Sam Worthington. It could have turned out differently. James Cameron tells MTV that the role of Jake Sully almost went to Jake Gyllenhaal or Matt Damon.
As you’d expect whenever any movie costs this much money, the studio wanted box office draw. Says Cameron, “The studio was interested in having a name, I think really just for the part of it we're doing right now, which is, 'How do you sell this movie? What are the handles on this thing that we can sell it to the media somehow or get media attention?' Well, having a name actor gets you on talk shows and all that sort of thing. So there was some value to that idea, and we explored it.”
But Cameron fell hard for Sam Worthington and in the end, let’s be honest, it really didn’t matter who they cast. Avatar is all about spectacle. It’s the massive, epic scale of Pandora and all of Cameron’s whiz-bang 3D effects which have propelled it to the top of the box office. Mostly though, Cameron just loved Worthington’s accent. He says, “You hear Sam talk and he sounds like Crocodile Dundee — but you hear him in the character and he's utterly and completely the guy.” Start practicing your Croc Dundee impression Matt Damon and maybe you’ll get a part in Avatar 2.
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