4. Sean Penn Was Considered For The Role Of Henry Hill
Before Liotta was cast to play Henry Hill, Scorsese considered various different actors to play the role, most notably Sean Penn. At the time of Goodfellas release in 1990, Penn's film credits were not only half of what they are now but they featured little to no examples of Penn playing the role of a gangster. Citing this as the reason that Scorsese chose to pass on Penn is purely speculative, but one thing that is known is that Scorsese finally settled on casting Liotta for the part when he saw his performance in Something Wild where he played an unstable and slightly mad ex-con trying to get his girlfriend back. Penn did eventually star in a gangster film though, 23 years after Goodfellas was released, he appeared in 2013's Gangster Squad. It wasn't quite as well-received as Goodfellas, but hey, you win some you lose some.
Joe is a freelance games journalist who, while not spending every waking minute selling himself to websites around the world, spends his free time writing. Most of it makes no sense, but when it does, he treats each article as if it were his Magnum Opus - with varying results.
