10 Actors Who Stupidly Turned Down Iconic Roles

5. Nic Cage - The Wrestler

The Role: Randy "The Ram" Robinson

Despite making some intelligent decisions in his career - okay, so they're few and far between - like Adaptation and Kick-Ass, Nic Cage has largely made himself a terrible reputation to wear in the past ten or so years, and he shows no signs of stopping, churning out unwatchable action dross that completely ignores the indie appeal he managed to build earlier in his career.

Had he followed through with his initial involvement with Darren Aronofsky's The Wrestler, that might have been an awful lot different, since Cage was attached to the role of Randy The Ram before Mickey Rourke (who the role was actually written for) stepped in and made it his own.

Cage bowed out of the project when he realised that there was no way he had the time to bulk up to the necessary size to play a steroid-using wrestler, missing out on the chance to relaunch his image the way Rourke did, and becoming the darling of the critics. Here's Cage talking about passing on the role...