12 Ridiculous Castings That Almost Ruined DC Comic Book Movies
10. Marlon Brando - Batman Returns
The Role: The Penguin
Who Was Cast Instead: Danny Devito
What Happened?
According to long-standing Internet rumour, actors as diverse as John Candy, Dustin Hoffman, Bob Hoskins, Christopher Lloyd and Brando were all considered at one time for the creepy Penguin role.
Luckily for everyone, Burton's desire to cast him was rebuffed brutally by the studio before he was ever seriously approached (and it wasn't the first time):
"I also wanted Sammy Davis Jr. to play Beetlejuice, so... sometimes my ideas don't go down so well with the studios. But hey, you try."
The Results
A young Marlon Brando would have been exceptional as a Batman villain: he was a genius who basically invented intense acting, with a notorious commitment to his roles. What's not to love?
Unfortunately, early 1990s Brando was an entirely different creature. He made the astonishingly poor Christopher Columbus: The Discovery the same year 1982 and had built a reputation as an expensive, difficult presence on his sets. Imagine if he'd been allowed to channel his weird The Island of Dr Moreau method into the Penguin... It would have been unwatchable.