OFCS members answer the question:
What do you think was the most severe case of movie miscasting?
Rob Gonsalves, eFilmCritic:
The all-time one would be John Wayne as Genghis Khan. But the worst one I’ve heard about recently is Scorsese supposedly considering Al Pacino as Frank Sinatra and Robert De Niro as Dean Martin. Jesus wept.
Phil Hall, Film Threat:
Hands down, Lucille Ball in Mame. She was far too old for the role (and the use of gauzy filters only accentuated her advancing age) and it was impossible for her to shake her “Lucy” persona and take over the persona of Auntie Mame. And don’t get me started on her singing!
Mike McGranahan, The Aisle Seat:
It’s a tie between Tara Reid playing an anthropologist in Alone in the Dark and Denise Richards playing a munitions expert in The World is Not Enough. This is not to suggest that pretty girls can’t also be brilliant; I’m simply suggesting that these two actresses fall far short of projecting the kind of natural intelligence that would make them credible in such roles. I mean, Reid can’t even properly pronounce “Newfoundland” in the movie, for Pete’s sake!
John Puccio, DVDTOWN:
I’d say it’s a toss-up between Barbra Streisand in Hello, Dolly! and Lucille Ball in Mame. Both were miscast so badly, it’s no wonder both films turned out critical disasters.
Kevin A. Ranson, MovieCrypt.com:
This may sound snarky, but Megan Fox in anything at all. Seriously, name one role she’s played that she seemed right for or actually contributed anything to.
Felix Vasquez, Cinema Crazed:
In the last five years, I’d say the worst casting in a film has to be Sam Worthington as the lead in Avatar. This was a humongous movie with amazing technology attached with an epic storyline, with an all-star cast and a vivid world and they cast the most one-dimensional bland leading man working today to take up the charge in a story that deserved a more interesting and much more appealing hero at the reigns than someone who is such a blank slate he practically has no face.
