10 Actors Who Were Too Scared To Accept Movie Roles

4. Dane DeHaan Was Scared About Playing Hollywood Legend James Dean

Life Dane Dehaan James Dean
Entertainment One

Not to be confused with the 2017 sci-fi flick about a gooey alien that kills Ryan Reynolds, 2015's Life centres on the friendship between photographer Dennis Stock and film icon James Dean, played by Robert Pattinson and Dane DeHaan, respectively.

Though DeHaan is fantastic in the role, he was absolutely mortified at the thought of taking it on initially, causing him to reject the offer not once, not twice, but five times in total: he later admitted he was "operating out of fear."

His reason for being so apprehensive - aside from the obvious pressure of portraying a legendary actor - was that he was a huge James Dean fan, and he didn't think he could do the role justice.

DeHaan is an exception on our list in that he obviously did accept the role, but he must've been pretty bloody terrified to say "no" five separate times!

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!