Matt Damon was offered to star in 'Avatar' by director James Cameron but he
rejected the role
Matt Damon talked about his "dumbest decision"
of rejecting the role in the super-hit film Avatar while expressing
regret.
The Good Will Hunting star was offered the main role in
the epic science fiction film with the director of the movie James Cameron
offering him 10% of the film’s box office profits.
However, the
actor chose to opt out of the deal which could have earned him $250 million,
a decision he later regretted.
"It’s the dumbest thing an actor ever did in the history of
acting," Damon told Entertainment Tonight in a joint interview with Zoe
Saldana.
"I don’t think your career suffered because of it, trust
me,” Saldana, who essayed the role of lead protagonist in the film, chimed
in.
"Do you know what kind of movie that would’ve been if I would
had been in it?" Damon joked before he hailed Saldana for being in many
films that have made over $2 billion.
"I didn't plan it, trust
me. I've just always felt blessed that I was picked, that I worked really
hard and auditioned. I'm not Matt Damon. I don't get to turn down Avatars,”
Saldana quipped.
"I've probably done, like, 50 movies,” Damon
continued. “I've never been in a movie that made $1 billion."
At Cannes Film Festival 2021, Damon made headlines when he
revealed he rejected the role of Jake Sully in the movie, which later went
to Sam Worthington.
“I will go down in history,” Damon said at
the time. “You will never meet an actor who turned down more money.”
In
an interview with BBC Radio, Cameron discussed the Damon’s decision of
turning down the movie, saying, “He’s beating himself up over this.”
“And
I really think you know, ‘Matt you’re kind of like one of the biggest movie
stars in the world, get over it.’ But he had to do another ‘Bourne’ film
which was on his runway and there was nothing we could do about that. So he
had to regretfully decline,” he added.
