- Kate Hudson, Bride Wars, 2008. A teen comedy for Roberts and Nikki Reed was churned into young adults’ fare with Hudson and Anne Hathaway. “Good actors and quick-witted women,” noted Chicago critic Roger Ebert, “here playing characters at a level of intelligence approximating HAL 9000 after he has had his chips pulled. No one can be this superficial and survive without professional care.”
- Rachel Nichols, GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra, 2008. By now Hollywood – or, at least producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura – was making films inspired by… toys! (He also made Transformers). Roberts wisely passed on Scarlettt. Rolling Stone critic Peter Travers never knew what to say about the acting, writing, directing… “because I couldn’t find any.”
- Ellen Page, Inception, 2009. Hard luck for Eric’s daughter… and Julia’s niece. But ffter Evan Rachel Wood turned him down, UK director Christopher Nolan rejected Emma, Emily Blunt, Carey Mulligan, Jessy Schram and Taylor Swift before settling upon a fifth Oscar nominee for his thriller in… the architecture of the mind.
- Emma Stone, The Amazing Spider-Man, 2010.
- Jennifer Lawrence, The Hunger Games, 2011.
- Ashley Benson, Spring Breakers. 2011. Fled Harmony Korine’s first feature in three years upon realising that her Brit had to take part in a sexual threesome. Officially, her exit was marked: Creative differences. Like who goes where?
- Mia Wasikowska, Stoker, 2012. For his first English-language film, South Korean director Chan-wook Park (Oldboy), was introduced to Hollywood casting. He had to see Emma, Bella Heathcote, Rooney Mara, Cary Mulligan and, of course for a vampire number, Twilighters Ashley Greene and Kristen Stewart! What a choice for Nicole Kidman’s daughter, besotted with and fretting over the most mysterious Uncle Charlie since Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt some 60 years earlier.
- Addison Timlin, Odd Thomas, 2012. Lily Collins, Kat Dennings, Portia Doubleday were also up for Stormy Lewellyn, feisty lover of the titular Anton Yelchin (his parents forgot to add T for Todd), a clairvoyant fry cook. Collins split to co-star with Emma’s aunt, Julia Roberts, in Mirror Mirror… going from Odd’s frying pan into the fire.
- Margot Robbie, Suicide Squad, 2015. When offered DC’s Harley Quinn, Roberts was more keen on heading up TV’s Scream Queens as Chanel Oberlin. Big mistake.
- Rosa Salazar, Maze Runner : The Scorch Trails, 2015. Roberts and Hailee Steinfeld were up for Brenda. The Australian Adelaide Kane chosen by the fans of the new dystopian franchise but had an already over-filled diary. Enter : Salazaar.
- Margot Robbie, Suicide Squad, 2015. Warners first offered DC’s Harley Quinn to Roberts – more keen on heading TV’s Scream Queens. Big mistake. Also up for three hours a day in make-up for Quinn: Alison Brie, Emily Browning, Lily Collins, Zooey Deschanel, Rooney Mara, Sara Paxton, Imogen Poots, Amanda Seyfried, Olivia Thirlby, Emma Watson, Olivia Wilde, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Evan Rachel Wood.“There’s always two characters: Harleen Quinzel and Harley Quinn,” explained Robbie. “Where Harleen takes over, she can be rational; then Harley takes over, and that’s the more erratic.She loves causing mayhem and destruction. She’s incredibly devoted to the Joker. They have a dysfunctional relationship, but she loves him anyway. She used to be a gymnast – that’s her skill set when fighting.”
- Emma Watson,Beauty and the Beast,2016. Roberts, Lily Collins, Emmy Rossum, Amanda Seyfried, Kristen Stewart were on Disney’s live-action list. But only Watson had been Harry Potter’s Hermione! And collected $18m without passing Go or going to jail.
Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls: 12