Ricky Gervais

Posted on by Tony CrawleyCategories:Actors

  1. Jared Harris, Ocean’s Twelve, 2004.    “Why say a couple of lines opposite Brad Pitt when I could be playing leads back home?… The money being offered was criminal. But I am not interested in money. I’m interested in doing something I am proud of. Money gives me the creeps. I hate it when people print how much I’m getting paid. It’s not guilt. It’s embarrassing enough being an actor for a living – it’s a worthless, pointless job. But when people know you earn a thousand times what a nurse earns it’s fucking embarrassing. I am not proud of my earnings. I’m proud of my work. I’ve probably turned down £10m.”
  2. Mackenzie Crook, The Merchant Of Venice, 2004.    One refugee from The Office for another,.. .Instead of David Brent, Al Pacino got to play with Gareth as Gratiano:“What, are we cuckolds ere we have deserved it?”
  3. Simon Pegg, Mission: Impossible III, 2005.     The creator-star of The Office had been booked as an aide to Cruise’s Ethan Hunt.Shooting was delayed so long, he had to pass it to the other big, new UK comic revelation from Shaun of the Dead, 2004. Not to mention, Spider-Plant Man, 2005.
  4. Tom Hollander,Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, 2006.   “I didn’t really fancy sitting in a hotel room in Los Angeles for nine weeks for two minutes on screen. I don’t really want to be an actor. I want to write and direct. I’ve been offered about ten British films. Obviously all shit. I was offered one with Johnny Depp, but again, it was a small character part, and I thought, ‘What’s the point?’ No one’s ever watched someone in seven films for one minute and said: Yeah, give him his own film… It doesn’t happen.”
  5. Simon Pegg, Star Trek, 2008.   
  6. Russell Brand, Arthur, 2010. “Why would I mess with a perfect comedy?”  One UK comic for another in the (awful) re-boot of Dudley Moore’s 1980 classic. Gervais passed – easily. Brand didn’t. And crapped all over it. Just another of $18m worth of roles The Office star turned down in Hollywood. “I’m not motivated by money.”
  7. Sacha Baron Cohen, Les Miserables, 2011.    Gervais, Rowan Atkinson, Billy Crystal, Steve Martin, Robin Williams…  For some reason, it was only comics (oh, and Geoffrey Rush) seen for the thoroughly nasty Thénardier.  Gervais, alone,  could have pulled it off. 

 Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls:  7