Christopher Nolan Wouldn't Take No For An Answer When This A-Lister Turned Down A Role

Between Oppenheimer and The Odyssey, Christopher Nolan’s big-screen epics have become synonymous with their sprawling, A-list casts.

In his latest offering alone, Matt Damon takes the lead alongside a supporting cast that includes fellow Oscar winners Anne Hathaway, Charlize Theron and Lupita Nyong’o, Nolan-verse regulars Robert Pattinson and Elliot Page and exciting names like Tom Holland, Zendaya and Samantha Morton.

The British director’s luck with casting Hollywood stars recently prompted talk show host Jimmy Fallon to question if the filmmaker has “ever gotten a no” – to which he admitted that he had to graft hard to win over a certain icon.

Nolan claimed: “The only no I would cop to is David Bowie for The Prestige. He was my great idol and everything, and I thought he’d be perfect to play Nikola Tesla. We sent him the script and everything, and he said no.”

The Prestige was one of Nolan’s earlier films, released in 2006 off the back of Batman Begins.

It starred Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale as two rival magicians in Victorian London, with Nolan having envisaged David Bowie for the role of the real-life pioneering inventor Nikola Tesla.

Eventually, the Space Oddity performer did relent and agree to play the role – but not without making Nolan work for it.

The filmmaker revealed: “I went back and said, ‘can I just go and meet him? Can I try and convince him in the room?’.

“And they agreed, and I hastily wrote him a better speech for his first appearance, turned up with a new script, and basically begged. And I got him to do it!”

Primarily known for his game-changing music career, Bowie did rack up a number of acting roles in his lifetime, including a brief appearance as Pontius Pilate in Martin Scorsese’s controversial The Last Temptation Of Christ and playing the Goblin King Jareth in Jim Henson’s dark fantasy movie Labyrinth.

Meanwhile, he isn’t the only one to have tried to give Christopher Nolan the brush-off.

Will Smith has claimed he turned down the lead part in Inception before Leonardo DiCaprio joined the project, as he “didn’t get” the plot.

“Those movies that go into those alternate realities… they don’t pitch well,” the Oscar winner suggested.

Nicolas Cage also alleged earlier this year that Nolan now refuses to work with him after he pulled out of his 2002 film Insomnia.