Elizabeth Olsen

Posted on by Tony CrawleyCategories:Actors

 

  1. Rachel Weisz,,The Bourne Legacy, 2011.  Three was enough for Matt Damon. (Until 2015…!)  The studio did not agree and kept the franchise alive by rebooting Jason Bourne as Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner)  – another victim of US secret service’s  Program.  Weisz won Dr Marta Shearing from a dozen other hopefuls: Eliza Dushku, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Milla Jovovich Kristin Kreuk, Diane Kruger, Jennifer Lawrence, Blake Lively, Michelle Monaghan, Elizabeth Olsen and three Kates: Beckinsale, Bosworth and Mara.  Why? Because as Chicago critic Roger Ebert pointed out she spends more time on-screen than is usual for women in actioners, is not just around for sex and “her performance stands up strongly beside Renner’s.” Bravo!

  2. Megan Fox, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, 2013.   Wearing his producer’s hat, director Michael Bay staggered Hollywood by giving April O’Neill to the girl he had sacked from Transformers: Dark of the Moon, 2011, for comparing him to Hitler. Olsen and Jane Levy had been in the loop. Plus Anna Kendrick, who – astonishingly – had also been seen for April… in 1989!

  3. Emily VanCamp, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, 2013.   For Captain Steve Rogers’ sequel, announced one year before the first film came out, Agent 13 was also aimed at: Alison Brie, Emilia Clarke, Jessica Brown Findlay, Felicity Jones, Anna Kendrick, Teresa Palmer, Imogen Poots and the ubiquitous Mary Elizabeth Winstead. Olsen still joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe, turning up in the end credits as Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, to set up Avengers: Age of Ultron, 2014.
  4. Jessica Brown Findlay, Winter’s Tale, 2013.     Also seen for  the Manhattan heiress heroine of  auteur Akiva Goldman reincarnation romance – with a flying white horse!  – were Lily Collins of The Mortal Instruments franchise, Sarah Gadon (from Amazing Spider-Man 2), Bella Dark Shadows Heathcote and Carrie’s Gabrielle Wilde.  And the winner was… Lady Sybil Branson of  TV’s Downton Abbey.
  5. Megan Fox, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, 2013.    Olsen, Anna Kendrick, Jane Levy and Elizabeth Olsen tested for April O’Neill.  And then producer Michael Bay surprised Hollywood by giving her to the girl he sacked from Transformers: Dark of the Moon, 2011, for comparing him to Hitler. Wearing his producer’s hat, Bay, hired her back for  his next huge hit, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, 2013. 
  6. Dakota Johnson, Fifty Shades of Grey, 2013.     Social networks were full of kinky ideas for the porn novel’s BDSM heroine, Anastasia Steele – from Jennifer Lawrence to Emma Watson. Few suggestions led to talks, auditions or tests. The suits did see Olsen, the dangerously demure younger sister of the Californian twins Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. Plus Emily Browning, Lucy Hale, Felicity Jones, Elisabeth Olsen, Danielle Panabaker, Imogen Poots, Margot Robbie, Alicia Vikander, London model Suki Waterhouse, Shailene Woodley. They were all lucky to escape the turgid, totally un-erotic enterprise. Only 14 minutes and 17 seconds of sex, no orgasms – and pubes added digitally to actors’ genital patches!
  7. Daisy Ridley, Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens, 2014.
  8. Astrid Bergès-Frisbey, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, 2015.       On Warner shelves almost as long as Justice League, David Dobkins’ Arthur & Lancelot, churned into Guy Ritchie’s fist-titled Knights of the Roundtable: King Arthur as the first of a possible sextet (but there are no Hobbits!). A dozen guys were seen for the king. Just j three delicious maidens for Guinevere: Olsen (from Sherman Oaks and the 2013 Godzilla), the UK’s Felicity Jones (who won the first Star Wars stand alone movie, Rogue One), Swedish Alicia Vikander (from Ritchie’s Man From UNCLE) and the Catalonia-born Bergès-Frisbey… aka Syrena the mermaid in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, 2010.
  9. Alicia Vikander, Tomb Raider, 2017.    Lara Croft is the girls’ James Bond.  Many tried to succeed Angelina Jolie  from her 2000 version – she won it from  20 candidates.  Two dozen lost to the Swedish Vikander, on a roll with her 2016 Danish Girl Oscar and Ex Machinarobot…The Franchise Brigade was represented by two from the Percy Jackson flicks (Alexandra Daddario, Rosario Dawson), two Terminators (Emilia Clarke, Summer Glau), two Underworlders (Kate Beckinsale, Rhona Mitra) and three Twilighters (Ashley Greene, Nikki Reed and Kristen Stewart who simply refused). Plus 007’s Gemma Arterton, Harry Potter’s Emma Watson, Marvel’s Wanda Maximioff (Elizabeth Olsen), Star Wars’Daisy Ridley, Transformers’ Megan Fox, TRON’s Olivia Wilde, X Men’s Jennifer Lawrence,  Other also-rans were: Jessica Biel (as perfect as Dawson), Emily Blunt, Emily Browning, Cara Delevingne (Vikander’s co-star in Tulip Fever,2017), Nina Dobrev, Anne Hathaway, Sienna Miller (too mild, surely), Saoirse Ronan and Moon’s Kaya Scodelario.

 Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls:  9