Jennifer Lawrence

Posted on 6 November 2023by Tony CrawleyCategories:Actors

Ashley Judd, Bug, 2005. William Exorcist Friedkin first wanted Jodie Foster for his latest stab at horror – more intense on-screen than at the box-office. Next? Jennifer Lawrence – called by some, The New Jodie (!). He settl3d for Judd. Hardly an equal talent. Not even close.
Blake Lively, Gossip Girl, TV, 2007-2012. Five years before busting through with Hunger Games, Lawrence auditioned as Serena Celia van der Woodsen. So did Ashley Green and Rumer Willis. Just not as serenely as lovely Lively. The 121 episodes were based on the books by Cecily von Ziegesar. Think Beverly Hills 90210 with a new number in Upper West Side Manhattan. In 2014, Lawrence won another Serena, Bradley Cooper’s troubled wife… in a most troubled movie.
Kristen Stewart, Twilight, 2008.
JLaw, as she would soon be known, lost Bella Swan. “I didn’t really know what [Twilight] was,” she told radio shock-jock Howard Stern. ”When you audition when you’re, like, a run-of-the-mill actor, you know, we’re all auditioning for all sorts of things, you just get like five pages and they’re like, ‘Act, monkey!’ When it came out, I was like, ‘Hot damn! Whoa!'” And so she won the X-Men and Hunger Games franchises, 2012-1015, plus her first Oscar for Silver Linings Playbook on February 24, 2013. First? Oh, there should be more.
Mia Wasikowska, Alice in Wonderland, 2009. “The one thing that really killed me, like the only time I’ve ever been truly devastated by losing an audition- ’cause most of the time you’re like, ‘Ah, wasn’t meant to be, move on, what can you do?’- was Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland,” she told Stern, “That one devastated me.” Mia, she praised, was perfect and amazing. “I couldn’t have had a British accent,” she added.
Emma Stone, Easy A, 2009. “I auditioned for Easy A… one thing that I was dying for.” Instead it went to her pal, Stone. ” You didn’t get it,” laughed Stone, “because you suck!”
Rooney Mara, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, 2010.
Juno Temple, Killer Joe, 2010. Lawrence was straight with director William Friedkin: “I’m the only actress in America who could play Dottie.” But she could not wait until he raised a budget (well, the Tracy Letts play was called “a hideous carnival of brutality and degradation that leaves you feeling dirty”) and she went off to school in X-Men: First Class.
Juno Temple, The Dark Knight Rises, 2011.
Brie Larson, 21 Jump Street, 2011. Jennifer was none too upset at losing Molly – when she won The Hunger Games trilogy. Larson was known as Toni Collette’s rebellious daughter in United States of Tara, TV, 2009-12.
Robin Lively, Savages, 2011. Once again, The Hunger Games ruled Lawrence out of Oliver Stone’s drama about two pals growing such great pot that a Mexican drug cartel threatens to kill their girl unless they work for the drug lords.
Maria Juan Garcias, Incarceron, 2011. Hollywood latest divas were humbled by the girl from Majorca winning her second big movie (for co-star Taylor Twilight Launter’s combine). Jennifer also lost The Dragon Tattoo battle – no matter, she won a herself a franchise: the dystopian post-America teen-triogly, The Hunger Games.
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!
Ambyr Childers, The Master, 2011. To her own surprise, the lovely blonde daytime soap alumna of All My Children (she was Colby Chandler for 139 episodes, 2006-2008) beat off such stellar opposition as Lawrence, Amanda Seyfried and Emma Stone to become Elizabeth in director Paul Thomas Anderson’s first outing since his 2007 double-Oscar-winning There Will Be Blood.
Eva Green, Dark Shadows, 2011. Anne Hathaway, the fast rising Lawrence and fast imploding Lindsay Lohan auditioned for Angelique – Green called her a mix of Bette Davis and Janis Joplin. That’s some cocktail!
Eva Green, Sin City: A Dame To Kill For, 2013. Ava Lord in Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez’ Sin Citysequel was written for Angelina Jolie with 14 back-ups: Green, Lawrence (too busy promoting… and winning her best actrsss Oscar for Silver Linings Playbook), Amy Adams, Elizabeth Banks, Kate Beckinsale, Helena Bonham Carter, Anne Hathaway, Salma Hayek, Elizabeth Hurley, Scarlett Johansson, Rose McGowan, Sofia Vergara, Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams. Variety critic Justin Chang was unmoved by the movie. “Rare indeed is the movie that features this many bared breasts, pummeled crotches and severed noggins and still leaves you checking your watch every 10 minutes.”
Elizabeth Olsen, Godzilla, 2013. JLaw, Emilia Clarke, Hilary Duff, Aly Michalka, Imogen Poots, Margot Robbie and Emmy Rossum were up for the (somewhat improved) second Hollywood reboot set for releases in the creature’s 60th birthday year of 2014. Olsen played the wife of hero Aaron Taylor-Johnson, her brother in The Avengers franchise.
Alicia Vikander, Seventh Son, 2013. Passed on the medieval thriller. Dianna Agron, Felicity Jones, Imogen Poots were also seen by the Russian director Sergey Bodro v before he settled upon the lovely Swede.
Daisy Ridley, Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens, 2014.
Margot Robbie, Focus, 2014. First, Kristen Stewart and Emma Stone passed, then Lawrence, Jessica Biel, Rose Byrne, Olivia Munn, Rosamund Pike, Michelle Williams were assessed for Jess, the beauty being coached in grifting techniques by an adoring Will Smith. Robbie was on holiday on a Croatian island when called to an New York audition. She packed in 20 minutes, and by catamaran, bus, two planes (waiting six hours for each), losing her luggage at JFK and wearing only denim shorts, shirt and no make-up, she got to the audition on time. Smith did not. “Hey, I was coming from Queens.” “Yeah?” snapped Robbie, “Well, I just came from an island off Croatia and I’m here on time.” She reckoned that outburst won her the movie.
Dakota Johnson, Black Mass, 2014. Lindsey Cyr was the doting lover of the infamous Whitey Bulger, the South Boston crime boss with a US Senator brother – and FBI help in avoiding jail and tackling the Italian Mafia muscling in on his territory. Also up for Lindsey in the damn near black-comedy were the too busy Lawrence, plus Anne Hathaway, Scarlett Johansson, Felicity Jones, Anna Kendrick, , Blake Lively and Margot Robbie.
Jennifer Jason Leigh, The Hateful Eight, 2014. On the list for Daisy Domergue were Davis, Demi Moore, Katiee Sackhoff, double Oscar-winner Hilary Swank, Michelle Williams, Evan Rachel Wood, Robin Wright and well, “I’m a huge Jennifer Lawrence fan,” Quentin Tarantino told Entertainment Weekly. “I can see her doing a good job with this rôle. . She was just doing me a courtesy to see me, I think. She was doing Joy. She had to do all this publicity on the Hunger Games movies. There was just no fucking way that she was available.” Besides Lawernce was 25 and JJL was a better fit at 53. “She’s a leader and she’s tough, she’s hateful and a survivor… [Quentin] writes very brave, bold, insane, fabulous women. Nobody writes women like he does.”
Kate McKinnon, Ghostbusters, 2015. “Ain’t no bitches gonna hunt no ghosts,” said an on-line video in the film – and zillions of Ghostfans across the planet. And try as it did (with too many Hot Shots!gags), the “comedy” failed rather than the ladies. Last thing JLaw required was another flop.(Eliza Dushku, Anna Faris, Alyssa Milano, Emma Stone, Rebel Wilson were potential ‘busterettes before the project became a reboot).
Elle Fanning, Live By Night, 2015. Although going older for most of his Boston gangsters, writer-producer-director-star Ben Affleck went eight years younger for the Southern belle Loretta Figgis, the religious nutter daughter of Chris Cooper’s police chief.
Brie Larson, The Glass Castle, 2016. JLaw was attached to produce and star as Jeanette of the highly dysfunctional, nomadic family Walls. (Dad being Woody Harrelson tends to say it all). Tney are soul sisters… They won their Oscars in independent movies (Winter’s Bone, Room), both have played Amy Shumer’s sibling and joined tentpoles with X Men, The Hunger Games for J Law, Kong: Skull Island, Captain Marvel for BLar.
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 Machina obot…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.
Rooney Mara, Nightmare Alley, 2020. Mexican director Guillermo del Toro said also looked over Lady Gaga and Jennifer Lawrence for Bradley Cooper’s slow burning carny thriller, He had co-starred with both before: Lady G in the 2017 directing debut, A Star Is Born – and JLaw in three films: Silver Linings Playbook, 2011, Serena, 2012, and American Hustle, 2013. Maybe that’s why De Toro voted Blanchett.

Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls: 26

WELCOME

to the films the stars did not make. The movies that never were. The most definitive collation of casting stories. Check up on all the films - of yesterday, today and tomorrow - that your favourite stars never made... A cast of thousands - 8,063 actors - to click on... More than 40 years in the making! And 2,777,633 words of spirited text.

The ultimate in movie trivia ... Better! Exactly the kind of history that Hollywood deserves. Back to front. Upside-down. Inside out. Full of flashbacks, close-ups, tracking shots (and, alas some badly edited sequences - sorry about that!) forming a fascinating, new and often bizarre flip-side perspective on your treasured movies and stars

HE SAID

“They’re doing stuff, but not with me. I’m not doing any more.” – Adam Driver on no more Kylo Ren/Ben Solo ... Or is it that there will be no more Star Wars?

“I’ve been acting for 42 years and then you make one cocktail…” – Stanley Tucci on his new fame as a TV food and cookery expert.

"The point is it's very hard work and you have to really want to do it. It has to be something that you're burning to say." – Martin Scorsese on directing at 80 and thinking “possibly only one more”.

“Whether you are a competent actor, or an artist, is incidental. The main business is: you’re product. I had a hard time steadying myself against that stuff.” – Robert Redford.

“I’ve never done the same thing twice and how many people can say that?” – Tom Hanks… forgetting his two successive Oscars.

“I was so excited when I got the script for Silent Night. There’s no dialogue in the entire movie! I thought this would be very good for me because it lets me use my gifts for telling a story visually. – John Woo on his Hollywood comeback at 77.

“I’ve gotta be nice about Marvel movies, because I named myself after a Stan Lee character named Luke Cage. What am I going to do, put Marvel movies down? Stan Lee is my surrealistic father.” – Nic Cage.

“The man who invented mornings was no Christian.” – Peter O’Toole.

“The moustache did the acting.” – Anthony Hopkins on Howards End.

“It’s very difficult to get 100 million people to watch anything,” – writer-director Joe Russo.

“I gave him a little part in Looper, where he got to be shot in the face by Bruce Willis. He was just so overjoyed… like a little kid.” – director Rian Johnson on his father.

“I'm not an actor - and I've got 64 films to prove it!” – Victor Mature.

“If you cast it right, you don’t have to tell the actors what to do.” – John Huston.

CCC CLIPS

>> Name Game. James Spader really started something with his Blacklist series. He played – remember? – Reddington. And now we have Austin Butler and, Emma Stone are in making Eddington… and newbie Glenn Powell is Huntingdon, his tenth gig since Top Gun: Maverick. Perhaps it’s time to re-issue Carrington… with, among others, Steven Waddington!

>> Christopher Nolan says “No, sadly no – no truth to those rumours.” About making the next Bond. So, no Cillian Murphy as Jimbo, then?

>> Rolling Stone. Those Poor Things, Emma Stone and Willem Dafoe, are – naturally – in the next release of their Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos. It’s Emma’s third Yorgos collaboration. Most likely she’ll be in his next one, too, a re-make of the South Korean hit, Save the Green Planet. That was a comedy. But one can never categorise a Lanthimos experience. After all this one was first titled… And.

>> Taylor Swift’s guy, US football superstar Travis Kelce, is making moves on movies. To be as famous as Dwayne Johnson. Although people are now beginning to ask: Dwyane Whosis?

>>Brandon Routh was Superman back in the day. Today he’s in…Ick.

>> A star sure was born! Lady Gaga now getting $10million for Joker 2…

>> Sean Ono Lennon says Emma Stone should play his dad. Now there’s a thought. After all, Cate Blanchett played Bob Dylan…

>> Sly Stallone has come this far without bothering with serial killers but that’s what he’s chasing in The Epiphany. He plays a retiring cop - what else at 78?

>> Thirty years after the first, Neve Campbell returns in Scream 7. She refused #6 over a money row…

>> Beatles director Sam Mendes made Skyfall and Spectre and another actor who has played John Lennon, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, might yet be the next 007…

>> Ryan Gosling tipped to be join the Marvelverse. (They need him more than he them). Henry Cavill may follow – so definitely no Bond then. Not after Argylle. If anyone witnessed that accident, could they call the appropriate authorities.

>> Will Smith comes back (or so he hopes) in an almost suicide squad blasting drug dealers in Sugar Bandits… while Colin Farrell settles for just Sugar – back to his usual smoothie looks after The Penguin…

>> White Lotus 3 resurrects Parker Posey, Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Charlotte Le Bon, Scott Glenn and introduces Patrick Schwarzenegger. But which one is going to flash…something?

CHAMPION'S LEAGUE

The battle for the top spot between Marlon Brando and Jack Nicholson has – I think – come to an end. Recently, we‘ve seen Marlon leading Jack by one or two movies – and then, almost immediately, vice-versa. The gap is much wider now between the former Mulholland Drive neighbours. Latest research dug up more titles for Jack - Mr Mom, A Christmas Story, Striptease, The Bicentennial Man, Expend4bles – so that he is now safe (?) at the top of league with 177 films he chose not to make compared to Brando’s 172. But you know - you never know…

(The full list of their huge lists of bypassed films are not on their pages for now - one of the hassles being tackled in our - yes, very slow! – restructuring).

Marlon Brando – 177
Jack Nicholson – 172
Paul Newman – 160
Cary Grant – 150
Robert De Niro – 140
Tom Cruise – 135
Dustin Hoffman – 126
Mel Gibson – 118
Sean Connery, Al Pacino – 117

Highest Brit remains, as always, Sir Sean at 117… followed by Laurence OIivier, 93; Richard Burton, 87; Peter O’Toole, 79; Elizabeth Taylor, 73; Peter Sellers, 72; Dirk Bogarde and James Mason, 68; Olivia De Havilland, 58; Vivien Leigh and Gary Oldman, 57.

Highest lady is Bette Davis, 97; Jodie Foster, 84; Michelle Pfeiffer, 81; Katharine Hepburn, 79; Julie Christie, 76; Meryl Streep, 75; Elizabeth Taylor, 73; Nicole Kidman, 72: Jane Fonda, 70; Julia Roberts, 68.

Younger Brigade: Johnny Depp 108; Leo, 75; Jim Carrey, 70; Madonna, 62; Natalie Portman, 57; Aishawarya Rai Bachchan, 40; Bridget Fonda, 36: Scarlett Johansson, Angelina Jolie, Uma Thurman, 35; Jake Gyllenhall, 33: Ben Affleck, 31.

(You'll find the full list at Champions in the Main Menu)

A BOND MISS

Is Léa Seydoux now a spy…or, to be more polite, a talent scout for Eon Productions? 007’s girl in both Spectre and No Time to Die appears to assisting the (rather quiet) search for the next Jimbo. In La bête (The Beast), one of her many new French films, Léa co-stars with Hammersmith’s George MacKay - Sam Mendes’ find for 1917. He learned French for the film, so this may not be his last Paris booking.

As Gabrielle and Louis, they work extremely well together as star-crossed lovers in three time-lines: 1904, 1914 and 2044. And he looks the business in his retro tuxedo. ‘Twould be fascinating to cast an eye over her report for Barbara Broccoli’s eyes only. On verra as Léa (and now even George) would say. We’ll see.

SHE SAID

“You need your parents to set boundaries and hold you accountable and keep you away from, like, weird people.” – Scarlett Johansson on surviving as a child actor.

“I was so deeply in love with Bella, it terrified me not to live up to her as a character. I felt like I was failing her in the first week, and failing Yorgos [Lanthimos]. ). It was just difficult. I could talk to him about it, but I couldn’t talk to her about it. “ – Emma Stone on making Poor Things, leading to her second Oscar.

“Everything was so beautiful up on that screen. That make-believe world was much more pleasant than anything I was experiencing. I didn’t like reality. I wanted to be in the movies, even though I knew I didn’t look like the other women on the screen. My mother said, ‘you better learn to type,’ but I didn’t listen. Somehow, some way, thank you God, it all came true.” – Barbra Streisand, receiving lifetime achievement honour from the Screen Actors Guild.

“If I arrive at a moment in the history of cinema where I am legally obliged to have some kind of police on my set telling me what I’m allowed to do, I would rather stop filming sex scenes completely.” – French director Mia Hansen-Løve.

“I’m not one to sit around doin’ nothin’, I would never retire, I’ll just hopefully drop dead in the middle of a song onstage, someday, hopefully one I’ve written.” – Dolly Parton.

“Playing it safe doesn’t necessarily get you anywhere. You have to take chances. especially if you’re a black woman. You have no choice.” – Halle Berry.

“The more famous an actress becomes, the less she's allowed to eat.” – Lana Turner.

“I don’t do T&A very well because I haven’t got much of either.” – Tea Leoni.

“I was an idiot in terms of career-building, but I had a great time.” – Sally Kellerman.

“As you get older, you realise your parents aren't these superheroes. They're actually people.” – Rumer Willis, daughter of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore.

“Everybody thought I was crazy. And by the way, I thought I was crazy.” – Jennifer Lopez on spending $20m of her own money on making This Is Me … Now: A Love Story.

“It’s dangerous to repeat performances. It becomes the sole thing on your gravestone.” – Helen Mirren on playing The Queen in The Queen and on stage in The Audience.

“I think I was offered every Marilyn Monroe script ever. I was like: Is this the end of the road creatively?’” – Scarlett Johansson on surviving as a star.

WAIT & SEE...

This is such a busy year for movies that various releases have been postponed until 2025… Captain America: Brave New World, Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17, Games of Thrones spin-off The Hedge Knight (not about a gardener), Ke Huy Quan’s actioner With Love, John Wick’s spin-off, Ballerina, Fast X :part 2, Avatar 3, Jurassic World 4, Black Mirror 7, Mission: Impossible 8, Fantastic Four, Superman and the dreaded Michael bio – more like horror film, surely. Oh and no The Batman 2 or Harry P TV series until 2026.