10 Craziest Reasons Actors Were Rejected For Movie Roles
5. O.J. Simpson Is Too Pleasant To Be A Terminator - The Terminator
It may be difficult to even imagine a world where Arnold Schwarzenegger didn't instantly immortalise himself as the formidable T-800 in James Cameron's The Terminator, but there was actually a time when the studio had their eyes on another sizeable star for said game-changing role.
Feeling that Arnie was a better fit for Kyle Reese early on, Orion Pictures originally pitched to have O.J. Simpson chase Linda Hamilton around for two hours as the murderous robotic presence. However, the director quickly squashed this proposal due to feeling that, at the time, Simpson was seen as "this likeable, goofy, kind of innocent guy."
The horrifying infamous real-life events involving Simpson's ex-wife and a restaurant waiter being murdered, with Simpson being found not guilty despite many still feeling he committed said savage acts, would later make Cameron's reasoning seem a little mind-blowing in hindsight. To put it mildly.
But it's also worth noting that Cameron also had zero interest in creating a movie where an African American man chased around a white girl with a knife for the duration.