Brad Pitt Was Originally Cast as Big Daddy in KICK-ASS, No One Wanted to Make the Film, and Everyone Said Hit-Girl Was a Disaster
I was blown away by Kick-Ass when it was first released. That movie was so much freakin’ fun. The fact that it got made when it did is kind of a miracle because no one in Hollywood wanted to make that movie!
During a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, director Matthew Vaughn and writer Mark Millar talked about the film and shared some interesting behind-the-scenes details about it. One of the things they revealed was that Brad Pitt was cast as Big Daddy and was also set to produce. That all fell apart, though, when Quentin Tarantino cast him to star in Inglourious Basterds, which is an opportunity you just don’t pass up.
When Pitt left, Nicolas Cage stepped in. He was looking for an opportunity to play a superhero like this on the big screen. The filmmaker also revealed that it was his idea to approach Big Daddy as a sort of Adam West figure. Vaughn said:
"I knew Nic loved comic books and superheroes, and this script was a love letter to superheroes. The film imagines what it would be like if the ultimate fanboy suddenly decided to play superhero, and some people mistakingly felt we were attacking the genre, but I knew Nic would buy in."
They also talked about how the studios were scared to be a part of the film. At the time, an R-rated superhero film was a tough sell. Vaughn explained:
"They weren't even intrigued. Literally every person who saw it or read the script said, 'No… I was desperate to make a superhero film, and I liked Mark's pitch the moment I heard it. According to Hollywood, it was the wrong move because no one wanted to make it. That just got me even more excited, because it seemed so obvious to me."
Vaughn’s instants were right. Now, with films like Deadpool, Logan, and Joker, R-rated comic book films are not off the table the way they used to be. Miller also recalled that the people they pitched the film to thought Hit-Girl was a disaster:
"They called Hit-Girl a disaster and said the only way to save her was to make her 25 instead of 10 years old. They also said no one wanted to hear superheroes cuss and recommended hand-to-hand combat instead of knives and guns.
Hit-Girl was the best part of the movie! That just shows you how blind some of these studio executives are. Vaughn went on to say that he mortgaged his house to finance the film:
“No studio would touch it. So I had to mortgage my house in order to finance the film, which was scary, to be honest. It's even more scary once you've mortgaged the house, made the film and realize you now need to sell it to the people who said ‘No' to it in the first place. Then you think, 'My god, I've actually drunk the Kool-Aid.'"
The movie went on to make over $96 million at the box office so it ended up bring a solid investment!