Had Matt Damon accepted James Cameron’s offer, things would have gone completely different for Avatar. And, of course, Damon would have been far richer than he is right now. Speaking with British GQ, Damon revealed that Cameron offered him the leading role in the 2009 blockbuster.
“Jim Cameron offered me Avatar,” Damon said. “And when he offered it to me, he goes, “Now, listen. I don’t need anybody. I don’t need a name for this, a named actor. If you don’t take this, I’m going to find an unknown actor and give it to him, because the movie doesn’t really need you. But if you take the part, I’ll give you ten per cent of…”
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Damon went on to explain why he turned down the role, which eventually went to Sam Worthington.
“So, yeah. I’ve left more money on the table than any actor actually,” Damon added. “I mean, the bigger thing still to this day, my bigger regret is – it would have caused a problem for Paul Greengrass and for all my friends on The Bourne Ultimatum, so I couldn’t do it – but Cameron said to me in the course of that conversation, “Well, you know, I’ve only made six movies.” I didn’t realise that. He works so infrequently, but his movies, you know all of them. So it feels like he’s made more than he has. I realised in having to say no that I was probably passing on the chance to ever work with him. So that sucked and that’s still brutal.”
Sam Worthington did solid work in portraying Jake Sully, but our guess is that Damon would have looked even better on the big screen as the renegade Marine veteran.
How do you think Matt Damon would have fared as Jake Sully? Let us know in the comments section below.
