10 Oscar-Winning Roles That Almost Went To A Different Actor

Winning an Oscar can truly change the trajectory of an actor’s career. Naturally, it isn’t everything, and some performers do just fine without ever winning an Academy Award. However, taking home the trophy proves that an actor has earned the respect of their peers, and if they play their cards right and make smart business decisions, they can have a very bright future ahead of them. 

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Jennifer Lawrence became a Hollywood darling in large part thanks to her Best Actress win for “Silver Linings Playbook,” and Halle Berry made history as the first Black woman to win the Best Actress statue for her work in “Monster’s Ball.” It’s fascinating to consider what opportunities would’ve been in store for them had those iconic roles gone to somebody else, and that was almost the case. For those performers and many others, they weren’t the first pick for their Oscar-winning roles. Someone else had to turn it down first, opening the door for them to ascend the ranks of Hollywood greatness.

Granted, many of the actors who turned down these Oscar-winning roles did just fine in the long run. Plus, there’s always the question as to whether a different performance would’ve been equally as good to warrant an Academy Award, leaving us to wonder what could’ve been. 

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Here are 10 Oscar-winning roles that almost went to different actors. 

For the Academy Award ceremony in 2013, Jennifer Lawrence won Best Actress for “Silver Linings Playbook” while Anne Hathaway (pictured above in “Colossal”) won Best Supporting Actress for “Les Misérables.” However, there’s an alternate reality where Hathaway makes history as the first person to win both of those awards in the same year had she taken the role of Tiffany Maxwell in “Silver Linings Playbook.”

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In 2014, Harvey Weinstein (gross) appeared on Howard Stern’s radio show (via The Independent) and was asked whether it bothers him when he can’t get the actors he wants for certain projects. The Weinstein Company distributed “Silver Linings Playbook,” and Weinstein explained how the team found its own silver lining when the initial actors dropped out: “‘Silver Linings Playbook’ was originally going to be with Anne Hathaway and Mark Wahlberg, and then Anne wasn’t doing it … [Director David O. Russell] and Anne had some creative differences, they didn’t see eye-to-eye.” 

Russell is an infamously combative director with abuse and assault allegations to his name, so it’s possible his personality didn’t mesh well with Hathaway. Regardless of what happened, Hathaway dropped out, and Lawrence, who was previously nominated for an Oscar for “Winter’s Bone,” went on to glory. It’s possible that if Hathaway remained committed to the film she wouldn’t have had time to film “Les Misérables,” which is one of her most recognizable roles to date, so everything worked out for the best in the end.

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Cary Grant is one of the most iconic stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood. He exemplified leading man material of the era with charisma and good looks to spare, yet he never won an Academy Award outside of an honorary one in 1970. There’s a chance he could’ve won a competitive one had he chose to star in “The Bridge on the River Kwai” instead of “The Pride and the Passion” (pictured above)

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In “Conversations with Classic Film Stars” (via Far Out), Grant mentions being offered Colonel Nicholson in “River Kwai,” which went to Alec Guinness instead, who went on to win the Oscar for Best Actor. As he tells it, “It’s true I turned down ‘Bridge on the River Kwai’ for ‘The Pride and the Passion.’ I did it to work with Marlon Brando, and then he quit just before we started and was replaced by Frank Sinatra.” It must’ve stung doubly that Grant potentially missed out on an Oscar for essentially no reason.

Colonel Nicholson was apparently a troublesome role to fill, as Guinness almost refused to star in “River Kwai.” He initially thought the script wasn’t that good and was dismayed when director David Lean brought up initially wanting Charles Laughton for the part. It may have been tough finding the right Nicholson, but Guinness wound up an Oscar winner while “Bridge on the River Kwai” is largely regarded as one of the best war films ever made.

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“The Blind Side” feels like a made-for-TV ABC Family movie that somehow became a major Oscar player when it came out. Sandra Bullock really came out the big winner in all of this, as she took home Best Actress for her role of real-life matriarch Leigh Anne Tuohy who takes in Michael Oher (Quinton Aaron) and convinces him to pursue football. 

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Bullock may have had Southern charm to spare, but the part was meant for Julia Roberts according to Tuohy herself, while speaking with Deseret News: “My part was completely written for Julia Roberts by 20th Century Fox. She was locked, she was loaded, everything was great … She’d already had two commitments, and she could not fit that time frame and they worked, they tried to juggle and it just didn’t happen.”

Roberts already won an Oscar for “Erin Brokovich,” but it’s probably for the best she avoided the firestorm that would surround “The Blind Side” in the decade following its release. The real Michael Oher has come forward to say much of “The Blind Side” is based on a lie and that the Tuohys enriched themselves by misrepresenting his relationship to them. Of course, none of this is Bullock’s fault or any of the actors in the film adaptation, but it does somewhat taint the film’s feel-good messaging.

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By the early 1990s, it seemed like John Travolta’s career was just about done. He was a big star in films like “Grease” and “Saturday Night Fever” but couldn’t seem to quite transition to other types of roles. That all changed with a little movie called “Pulp Fiction,” which resurrected his career and put the star back on the map. But it’s possible Travolta could’ve received a resurgence had he taken the titular role in “Forrest Gump” instead.

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Travolta confirmed to MTV (via Collider) that he was offered “Forrest Gump” but doesn’t feel bad about missing out on it. “If I didn’t do something Tom Hanks did, then I did something else that was equally interesting or fun,” he said. “I feel good about some I gave up because other careers were created.” Travolta’s referring to the fact that he’s actually missed out on several Tom Hanks roles over the years. He was offered lucrative parts in both “Splash” and “Apollo 13” but missed out for one reason or another. 

Hanks may have gotten the Oscar for “Forrest Gump,” but “Pulp Fiction” won the hearts and minds of cinephiles. Decades after the ceremony, you’ll be hard-pressed to find anyone who doesn’t think “Pulp Fiction” (or at the very least “The Shawshank Redemption”) should’ve beat “Forrest Gump” in the Best Picture race. 

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Mel Gibson is no stranger to historical epics, having taken home Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture (as a producer) for “Braveheart.” But he missed what could’ve been a stellar follow-up with 2000’s “Gladiator,” though Gibson isn’t beating himself up too much over the loss. 

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At 2025’s MegaCon in Orlando, Florida (via People), Gibson spoke at a panel about all the jobs he missed out on, including James Bond back in the 1980s. But when it came to “Gladiator,” he said, “Ridley [Scott] came to me with ‘Gladiator;’ I didn’t do that movie. I was doing ‘The Patriot,’ so I couldn’t do ‘Gladiator.’ So Russell [Crowe] did it, and he did a great job.”

Gibson really loves “Gladiator,” as he also appeared on “The Joe Rogan Experience” to discuss a litany of political topics, but he also brought up how he likes to reference “Gladiator” in his own works: “I always like to reference just a shot, it’s in a Scott movie and you don’t know why it works … It’s that first shot in ‘Gladiator’ where he’s running his hand over the wheat, with that music and stuff. Why does that work? I don’t know. You can’t explain it, but it works.”

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It’s honestly a shame Angela Bassett has never won a competitive Oscar. She gave the definitive biopic performance as Tina Turner in “What’s Love Got To Do With It,” and took superhero movie acting to new heights in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.” She’d be nominated for both films but would win neither, but she could’ve had another shot at Oscar gold had she taken the role of Leticia Musgrove in “Monster’s Ball.”

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Ultimately, it was a matter of Bassett not being comfortable with the material, as she told Newsweek (via Entertainment Weekly), “I wasn’t going to be a prostitute on film.” It’s worth noting that Leticia, who was ultimately portrayed by Halle Berry, isn’t actually a sex worker, but she does have explicit scenes in which she has a sexual relationship with corrections officer Hank Grotowski (Billy Bob Thornton). Bassett continued, “I couldn’t do that because it’s such a stereotype about Black women and sexuality. Film is forever. It’s about putting something out there you can be proud of 10 years later. I mean, Meryl Streep won Oscars without all that.”

During Berry’s Oscar acceptance speech, in which she became the first Black woman to win Best Actress at the Oscars, she says how this moment is bigger than her and lists off other incredible Black actresses, including Bassett. And Bassett harbored no ill will, as she continued, “It wasn’t the role for me, but I told her she’d win, and I told her to go get what was hers.”

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“La La Land” is a heavily lauded musical that gave Emma Stone her first Oscar and remains a favorite film for many in the 21st century. A big part of that comes down to the electric chemistry between Stone and her co-star Ryan Gosling. Would it achieve the same success with a different duo at the helm, specifically one where Emma Watson plays Mia? 

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Watson was originally attached to “La La Land” but was replaced by Stone due to her commitment to another musical — 2017’s live-action “Beauty and the Beast.” Signing on for any single movie is a big commitment, but it’s another thing entirely when dealing with musicals where dance choreography and singing lessons are also on the docket. Watson has stated how she pulled out of “La La Land” due to scheduling issues and not wanting to overextend herself. 

Another big change that could’ve happened to “La La Land” is that Miles Tiller was supposed to play the male lead before Gosling. But Gosling and Stone already had ample chemistry from previously working on “Crazy, Stupid, Love” and “Gangster Squad.” Watson and Teller certainly could’ve been fantastic together, but it’s hard to imagine a better version of “La La Land” than what we got.

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“The Silence of the Lambs” swept the Oscars, surprising its creators when the film took home the awards for Best Picture, Best Director Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay. It’s only the third film in Oscar history (behind “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” and “It Happened One Night”) to take home what’s known as the Big 5, and it’s all the more impressive seeing as it’s a horror film, a genre typically ignored by the Academy. Jodie Foster stunned audiences as Clarice Starling, but she wasn’t always a shoo-in for the part.

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At the 2015 Austin Film Festival, director Jonathan Demme relayed how Foster fought hard for the role, as she was a huge fan of Thomas Harris’ novel, but she wasn’t even really on his radar initially. He even went so far as to say, “I wouldn’t believe Jodie Foster in that part,” at least at first. Michelle Pfeiffer was under consideration at one point. Demme recounted sending the script to Meg Ryan, who sent it back in disgust. Demme also wanted Laura Dern at one point, and she seemed game to sign on. However, others behind the scenes were concerned, since she hadn’t really been in a big movie at that point, and after meeting with Foster once more, Demme was convinced she was the right pick all along. 

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Daniel Day-Lewis playing Abraham Lincoln in a movie directed by Steven Spielberg sounds like it was engineered in a lab to win an Oscar. Day-Lewis was indeed phenomenal in the lead role of 2012’s “Lincoln,” but he wasn’t initially attached. Spielberg originally wanted to go with his “Schindler’s List” collaborator, Liam Neeson.

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Neeson was attached during a previous iteration of the script, which sounds like a more straightforward crib-to-grave biopic story, according to an interview the actor did with GQ. The script changed to focus on a shorter period of Lincoln’s life, and in March 2009, Neeson’s wife Natasha Richardson died. Neeson even sat down for a readthrough of the new script after all this, but he recounts immediately becoming disillusioned: “We started reading this, and there was an intro, and then I see ‘Lincoln:’ where I have to start speaking, and I just — a thunderbolt moment. I thought, ‘I’m not supposed to be here. This is gone. I’ve passed my sell-by date. I don’t want to play this Lincoln. I can’t be him.”

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Neeson stepped down, and Spielberg completely understood. At that point, the director got to work courting Day-Lewis for the role, which required some help from Leonardo DiCaprio. But the rest, as they say, is history. 

It’s odd to think that the phrase “Academy Award winner Eric André” could’ve entered our lexicon, but it could’ve been a reality. Following the 2025 Academy Awards where Kieran Culkin won Best Supporting Actor for playing the free-spirited yet tormented Benji in “A Real Pain,” André appeared on the “Whiskey Ginger” podcast where he revealed how director/actor Jesse Eisenberg offered him the role first.

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“Two years ago, Jesse Eisenberg called me … offered me the role that Kieran Culkin got the Oscar for,” the actor stated. “I was like, ‘That seems really miserable and not in my lane.’ I read the script. I was like, ‘To go to Poland for six weeks and shoot a movie where we’re just babbling about the Holocaust, seems like a bummer.'” Naturally, there’s always the question as to how much of an Oscar win is for a performance and how much is it for the actor themselves. 

Culkin is a bit of a critical darling following his turn on “Succession,” where he was honored with an Emmy and Golden Globe. Would the Academy bestow the same honor to “A Real Pain” had it starred a guy who freaks out celebrities on an absurdist talk show? Regardless, even André admits that any chance he has at Oscar glory is probably gone: “The motherf****r won an Oscar for the role I passed up. It’s not like I get offered roles constantly. I’m not f***ing Leonardo [DiCaprio].”

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