The first ever teaming of Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio has everyone excited for Once Upon A Time In Hollywood.
But once upon a time in Hollywood, the two gigantic movie stars almost worked together before — playing gay lovers!
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Director Gus Van Sant revealed on Wednesday that when he was attached to Brokeback Mountain, he tried to rope Brad and Leo into the project first — and they weren’t the only A-listers to say no!
He told IndieWire:
“Nobody wanted to do it. I was working on it, and I felt like we needed a really strong cast, like a famous cast. That wasn’t working out. I asked the usual suspects: Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Ryan Phillippe. They all said no.”
Turned out to be a bad move.
The film, which was eventually directed by Ang Lee, went on to be nominated for eight Oscars and won THREE!
Van Sant, who loved the project from the beginning, admits maybe he should have compromised his vision in order to get it made:
“What I could have done, and what I probably should have done, was cast more unknowns, not worried about who were the lead actors. I was not ready. I’m not sure why. There was just sort of a hiccup on my part. There was something off with myself, I guess, whatever was going on.”
In retrospect it’s tough to see anyone other than Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger in those parts. But we do wish we had a scene or two just as a sampler.
You know, just to see what might have been.
And hey, maybe Brad and Leo will have sex in a tent in Tarantino’s movie!
[Image via Instagram.]