Culture Slut: The Alternative Casting Multiverse & Cult Characters that were Almost Played By Someone Else
Words: Misha MN
There are certain things that I find myself thinking about every single day, things that aren’t related to anything practical, or pertinent, or even possible, just some little thoughts that pass the time. The first is the Met Gala 2019, Camp: Notes on Fashion, and how everyone got it so wrong. The second is what if the 1917 film Cleopatra starring Theda Bara wasn’t lost in the fire that claimed so many of Hollywood’s master prints of the gems of the silent era - a 20th century version of the burning of the Library of Alexandria. The third, and possibly most important, is what would have happened if Toni Colette had been cast in Rob Marshall’s Chicago in 2002. Would Toni have ascended to supreme stardom, emblematic of the new millennium like Renee Zellwiger was in the early 00s? Would she finally have won an Oscar? Would the film have been as good - or better - than the almost-masterpiece that it is today?
Scholars of popular cinema all know how serendipitous casting can be for the most beloved classics. Anne Hathaway was the ninth choice to play Andy Sachs in The Devil Wears Prada (2006). Julia Roberts was almost the last call for Pretty Woman (1990), way behind such stars as Demi Moore, Laura Dern and Michelle Pfeiffer. It's hard now to imagine such career-defining performances in the hands of another actor, and how that would have affected the entire cinematic landscape of Hollywood. Toni Colette was offered Bridget Jones (2001) before Renee, she declined because it was too similar to Muriel’s Wedding (1994) for her taste, but what if she had taken Roxie Hart?
I’ve always found the casting process intriguing, as have the rest of the world, from the amount of people calling for a documentary about the infamous Madonna Boot Camp some actresses were put through when trying to find someone to play in an inevitable biopic. Luckily for us, one of the most highly sought after roles in cinematic history has reels and reels of audition footage, screen tests and initial shoots for many of the top contenders. I’m talking, of course, about the infamous hunt for Scarlett O’Hara, star of Gone With The Wind, in the late 1930s.
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We know now that role was perfected by Vivien Leigh, but every actress in Hollywood at that time wanted a crack at it. The screen tests, many of which are available (at least partially) on YouTube, are fascinating, surreal little windows into alternative realities where someone else was chosen. Bette Davis made an aggressive play for the role, but had to settle for Jezebel instead. Paulette Goddard, wife of Charlie Chaplin (and later Burgess Meredith!) is widely considered the runner up in the Scarlett race, showing much nuance and vulnerability in her screen tests. My favourite was possibly Tallulah Bankhead’s test, just some shots of her in modern dress, smoking a cigarette, but it’s enough to make the mind boggle. Tallulah could have been great as the scheming older Scarlett, but she was always too worldly, too knowing, too alluring to play her in the first act of the film, where she’s meant to be a young girl. But still… What if?
Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022), one of the most successful films of the 2020s, was an incredible showcase for Michelle Yeoh, but it wasn’t initially intended for her at all. Directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert originally wrote the script for Jackie Chan, which would have changed the entire emotional core of the film. As they moved along in production, they decided to reroute it to Michelle, thinking that a story about a mother/wife would be more relatable. In interviews, the Daniels even revealed their back up plan for if Michelle was unable to commit; they would adapt and use one of their own mothers in the lead role. I would lay down my life for Michelle Yeoh, but part of me would love to see how the film would turn out if Mrs Kwan or Mrs Scheinert was leading this absurdist epic. One imagines it might not have been such a hit at the Oscars that year.
From one epic to another, we come to one of the most fraught casting dramas ever to happen in Hollywood: Valley of the Dolls (1967). A grand voyage into camp, described as Hollywood’s most beloved piece of shit, this production was cursed before it even started filming. We follow three different women into showbiz, each on their own path and fighting their own pill-based demons, and each representing a different cinematic type. We have Neely O’Hara, a rising star who gets hooked on pills and booze, Jennifer North, a beautiful showgirl who is admired only for her body, and Anne Wells, an ingenue who gets drawn in to affairs with agents and producers, rounded out with the ultimate diva Helen Lawson, an ageing star about to be eclipsed by the next big thing. The cast we ended up with (Patty Duke as Neely, Sharon Tate as Jennifer, Barbara Parkins as Anne, and Susan Hayward as Helen Lawson) all play their parts well enough to make the film as memorable as it is, for better or worse, but when we look into the intended casting choices, another world opens up.
Jennifer, the body without a mind, was set to be played by Raquel Welch, then a rising star fresh from B movies that mainly featured her running around in fur bikinis (One Million Years B.C. (1966) needs to be seen to be believed). Raquel eventually pulled out, reluctant to take on another sexpot role as she was trying to be taken seriously as an actress.
Her real story is echoed in the character of Jennifer, who eventually has to resort to making nude films to make money so she can support her ill husband. She’s never allowed to transcend her body though, as after she is told she needs a double mastectomy, she chooses to end her life instead, forever trapped and defined by her body. I understand Raquel’s instinct to not be associated with this role, but I still wonder what could have happened had she stayed with the production (and also if there had been a better director than Mark Robson, a list of whose crimes on set can be found in the fabulous book Dolls! Dolls! Dolls!: Deep Inside Valley of the Dolls, the Most Beloved Bad Book and Movie of All Time by Stephen Rebello).
Neely O’Hara, the rising star, had a real rising star attached at the beginning of production: Barbra Streisand. Neely’s story was based on the life of Judy Garland, her meteoric rise to success, the excessive use of pills to keep her sedated, to wake her up, to keep her under control, everything you can imagine, and it was thought that the role needed to be played by someone truly remarkable.
At this time, Streisand had not yet made her film debut, but was already a broadway star, and both a Tony and Grammy award winner, so her appearance here would have been truly monumental. Team Streisand chose to be cautious, however, and instead of using this scandalous book adaptation as Barbra’s film debut, they waited until Funny Girl (1968) got the Hollywood treatment, the role that had made Barbra a stage star and one they knew could make her a film icon. Interestingly though, in a later scene when Neely has a meltdown about a younger star coming up behind her, the girl is styled exactly like Barbra, a chin length bob, lots of eye liner and a sailor collar, a definite visual reference for those in the know.
“Every inch of Hollywood is littered with What Ifs. What if Julia Roberts was never in Pretty Woman? What if Marilyn Monroe had played Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), the preferred casting choice of Truman Capote?”
The most tumultuous casting was without a doubt that of the ageing diva Helen Lawson. This is the kind of role that Hollywood loves, Bette Davis’ Margo Channing in All About Eve (1950), Gloria Swanson’s Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard (1950), and later Gina Gershon’s Cristal Connors in Showgirls (1995) - another doomed camp classic - so the question here is who would they choose? They chose Judy Garland, who had been absent from film for a long time, and was going through many hardships as a result of her dependence on pills and booze, her embezzling accountants and her current state of homelessness, constantly moving from hotel to hotel.
As I’ve already said, the character of Neely was pretty clearly an avatar of Garland, so to have Garland herself also in the movie was a surefire way to produce crackling tension and whip up public interest. Patty Duke later spoke in interviews about the mistreatment of Garland on set, how she knew that this pulpy part was beneath her but she needed the money. Duke talks about Mark Robson, and how he would purposefully leave Garland waiting for hours on end and then berate her mercilessly.
Eventually, Garland turned back to pills and booze and was fired, with Susan Hayward brought in to replace her. Hayward was a good sport though, and negotiated not only a fee for herself, but ensured that Garland was also paid the fee she had been promised. God bless Susan Hayward. Helen Lawson is the very definition of resilience, she is, as she herself says “a barracuda”. Garland was a great actress, and had been many things in her time, but a barracuda was never one of them. Her fare was always vulnerability, so one can only think that she was always set to fail in this grand camp epic. Her screen tests remain though, and her recording of I’ll Plant My Own Tree, which despite being a bit tawdry in its lyricsm benefits massively from Garland’s innate talents. It was, at least, much better than the version used in the final film.
Every inch of Hollywood is littered with What Ifs. What if Julia Roberts was never in Pretty Woman? What if Marilyn Monroe had played Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), the preferred casting choice of Truman Capote? What if Tallulah Bankhead had been given a chance to play in smart comedies instead of dreary heavies? And the biggest What If of all, what if Anna May Wong had been allowed to play the lead role in 1937’s The Good Earth?
This Chinese historical drama, based on a book by the Nobel prize winning author Pearl S. Buck was the perfect opportunity for Wong, the most famous Chinese-American star of the era, to make an unmissable impact in Hollywood. Unfortunately, thanks to the Hays code and a highly conservative administration overseeing all, it was decided that casting Wong opposite a white actor, Paul Muni, would promote miscegenation, interracial relationships. So instead, the part was played by Luise Rainer, a white German actress who donned yellowface makeup (like every other white actor in the film) and went on to win her second Oscar (two in two consecutive years). But what if that had been Anna May Wong? What if she had been allowed to shine? What if Hollywood had been less conservative? What if Hollywood had allowed artists to create the best possible piece of art instead of the most sellable product? If Anna May Wong had played in The Good Earth, would we have had to wait until 2023 to see an Asian woman finally win a Best Actress Oscar?
Everything Everywhere All At Once showed us a multiverse of paths not taken. I will spend every day of my life waiting for the time when I can verse jump into a world where Hollywood never stood in the way of great artists. What if Toni Colette had been cast in Chicago?
