Matt Damon Was Up For a Rude Awakening After He Got Excited For a Major Role in Multi Billion Dollar Movie Franchise
American actor Matt Damon is widely known for his diverse filmography and excellent acting skills. With his breakthrough role being in Good Will Hunting, over the years, he has starred in many blockbuster movies, the most recent of them being Christopher Nolan’s biographical thriller Oppenheimer.
Although Damon doesn’t have a lack of good projects to work on, there is one particular role that he was highly interested in. Like any other person in the world, the actor had hoped that his desires would be fulfilled. Unfortunately, his age stood in the way of him having what he wanted so badly.
Matt Damon was Rejected by Star Trek Director
In 2007, director J. J. Abrams accepted Paramount’s offer to direct the big-screen reboot of Star Trek and embarked on his hunt to find the perfect actor to play the role of Captain James T. Kirk. Coincidentally, this was also the role that Matt Damon happened to be interested in. However, J. J. Abrams wasn’t on board with this idea because Captain Kirk was supposed to be a young guy and not someone in their late thirties.
Damon was rumored to be playing the role for the longest time before he confirmed that he was, in fact, not going to portray Captain Kirk. In an interview, he said:
“I finally called J.J. Abrams because I was like, ‘Dude, what is going on?’ He was like, ‘You’re way too f***ing old! You’re like 15 years too old to play Captain Kirk in this movie.”
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The Jason Bourne actor explained this decision of Abrams saying that his age back then which was 36 coincided with the age when James T. Kirk got out of the academy. So, if the movie was going to stay true to its source material, it would have to cast a 25-year-old guy in the role.
Matt Damon was Offered the Role of a Different Kirk
Matt Damon not being cast as Captain Kirk made complete sense by J. J. Abrams’ logic as the director had a clear idea about what he wanted in the actor who would be playing the role. Abrams wanted the actor who would be playing the role to bring originality to it so that it wasn’t too much of a far cry from what William Shatner brought to the role with his iconic performance.
Abrams had a different role in mind for Matt Damon. This role was also of a Kirk but certainly not the one that Damon wanted. Abrams wanted Damon to play the role of Captain Kirk’s father, George Kirk who makes a brief appearance in the movie. However, the Air actor declined the role giving what Abrams said “in the most gracious and understandable and logical of reasons.”
Chris Hemsworth ended up playing the role of George Kirk and Abrams said that Hemsworth did a great job at it. The Mission Impossible director insisted that it had been decided to cast the most perfect actors rather than famous ones for the roles in the movie so not casting Matt Damon was a no-brainer given his popularity.
Source: MTV News
