10 HUGE Movie Roles Actors Were Too Scared To Take On

Denzel Washington is no stranger to heavy subject matter. The veteran actor won critical acclaim for the demanding role of homophobic lawyer Joe Miller opposite Tom Hanks in the devastating Philadelphia.

Offering a nuanced and uncompromising portrayal of bigotry, the role saw Washington move away from straightforward heroics and toward the moral ambiguity which would go on to define his later career in classics such as Ridley Scott’s 2007 epic American Gangster.

Despite this, the actor nonetheless balked when offered the starring role in Se7en, saying the intense, unrelenting darkness of the script put him off the project. The role went to Brad Pitt, cementing his superstardom, and it can be argued that Washington’s appearance in The Bone Collector saw him attempt to ape the same dark tone he had avoided only a few years earlier.

Moreover, it’s a bit surprising to hear his fear of such a dark project, considering Washington would go on to star in the criminally underrated Fallen, an even darker police procedural which added supernatural elements to Se7en’s grisly formula.

Hell, he’d even win an Oscar for his work in Training Day, playing a policeman so viciously corrupt that most of the villains of Se7en would run screaming from him.