Robin Williams Was Jealous of Jim Carrey After He Took On the Role of The Riddler in BATMAN FOREVER
The late comedy genius Robin Williams has a laundry list of hit films from his career. They were mostly comedies, but he had his share of dramas, two of which landed him Oscar nominations, and one which gave him the one Academy Award of his career. But the one genre the actor never broke into was comic book. It seems like this would have been the perfect fit for Williams, and he almost made it happen multiple times, but the longest-lasting torch he carried was for the Batman franchise.
Williams was first tapped to play the Joker in Tim Burton’s Batman, but plans later fell through. Williams explained in an interview posted by the take2marktv youtube channel:
“It happens. Sometimes they use you as bait. They’ll say, ‘We’re sending it out to him,’ and you go for it. And then they give it to somebody else.”
Williams added that even though he missed his chance on the Joker, there was another Batman villain he had his eye on, saying:
“I don’t know what happened with that. But maybe there’ll be something else down the line, maybe the Riddler. Who knows?”
Williams’ line about the Riddler was more than just wishful thinking. The actor was tapped to play the character in director Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever. In fact, the script was written with Williams in mind. But once again, plans fell through.
The film’s screenwriter, Lee Batchler, previously told The Hollywood Reporter:
“Later on when we wanted to do the Riddler, it was going to be Robin Williams. With the Riddler, we wrote it with Robin’s voice. He read our script and loved it, they just didn’t make the deal. So when it came to Jim Carrey, he very much did our script. It was just a little less Robin Williams.”
Jim Carrey went on to play the role, and there were Hollywood rumors to the effect that Williams was very jealous and had a beef with Carrey over the steal. But Carrey shut down rumors that there was ever a feud between the actors, and even spoke of Williams’ kindness to him,
Carrey would later go on to deny Radar Online’s claim that there was a true conflict between him and Williams, telling Cinemablend:
“Radar Online is completely off base and creating a feud that didn’t exist. Robin may have expressed insecurity about me and my rise to success but I have never had anything but the greatest respect for him and his genius. He was always respectful to me in person.”
Carrey went on to add, “There’s no feud if one side isn’t aware of it.”
Williams was later interested in joining director Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins franchise, and talked about wanting to play the Joker, but after that part was given to Heath Ledger, to much acclaim, Williams was just down to take on any part, saying in an interview:
“I’d play the Riddler in the next Batman, although it’d be hard to top Heath as the villain, and I’m a little hairy for tights. I’m using this article as an ad. Chris, call me, I’ll do anything. I could be a great character — or some weird little man in the background in Arkham Asylum.”
It’s too bad that Williams never got to play a part in the Batman universe. He was a busy actor in the years after the first Nolan Batman movie was released, so maybe that’s why. But I wish he would have just gotten to play in that world for a little while before he left this one.
via: CheatSheet