10 Actors Who Stupidly Turned Down Iconic Roles

2. John Travolta - Forrest Gump

The Role: Forrest Gump

These days it's hard to imagine anyone other than Tom Hanks in the role of the lovable and slow-witted hero of Robert Zemeckis' adaptation of Winston Groom's book, but it was almost a lot different as Grease star John Travolta turned the role down.

He has since admitted that the decision was a mistake, but the same year, he did make Pulp Fiction for Tarantino, and re-announced his cool in a way that Forrest Gump would probably never have managed. But then, when the role you turned down ends up landing its eventual star an Oscar for Best Actor ahead of your own nominated performance, as happened to Travolta in 1994, it's probably a lot easier to just accept that it was a mistake.

You would have thought John might have learned from his experience during the 80s - a decade of waste for the actor, who couldn't seem to catch a break, and managed to turn down both An Officer And A Gentleman and American Gigolo during his so-called downturn. But no.