Yahoo News These Hollywood stars turned down Brokeback Mountain
Brokeback Mountain starred Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal and received acclaim when it was released in 2005.
To this day, movie fans are still outraged by the fact that it controversially missed out on the Best Picture Oscar to Crash.
But Heath and Jake weren't the first choices for Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist.
Gus Van Sant was originally keen on helming the movie before Ang Lee signed on as director. And Van Sant, who has directed Milk and Good Will Hunting, has revealed that he tried to get huge Hollywood stars to play the lead roles, including Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt.
"Nobody wanted to do it," he told IndieWire. "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."
Diana Ossana, one of the producers and writers on the movie, confirmed Van Sant's claims.
"Yes, all those young gentlemen (at the time) turned down the project, for various reasons," she said.
Van Sant added that if he was doing it all over again, he would have considered the option of going for lesser-known and more unknown actors.
"What I could have done, and what I probably should have done, was cast more unknowns, not worried about who were the lead actors," he said. "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."
Ossana added: "Gus' version would have followed our screenplay, which is also how Ang [Lee] shot the film. Gus arrived at our door five days after we sent the script out into the world. He was eager and passionate about it."
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