15 Actors Who Stupidly Turned Down Billion Dollar Movies

8. Jessica Chastain - Iron Man 3

You'd probably be forgiven for remembering that Rebecca Hall was even in Iron Man 3 after the whole Aldrich Killian/Mandarin thing sucked up all the post-release publicity. It also didn't help that her role was greatly reduced - as a poor indictment of her performance as the duplicitous Maya Hansen.

Would that have happened if Jessica Chastain had played Hansen as initially planned? You have to suspect it would have been harder to remove her and make her character far less complex.

Chastain turned down the role after her talks to play Hansen were widely covered in the press. She posted to her Facebook wall to break the news:

"Sorry to say that Iron Man 3 isn't going to work out. My schedule is jammed packed and I can't fit anything else in. The press announced my possible attachment far too soon. I know many of you wanted me to be involved, and I'm so sorry to disappoint you. Hopefully there'll be another Marvel film in my future. Shane Black and everyone on the IM3 team are really wonderful. I'm very excited to see the film when it comes out. xx"

What She Made Instead

Sadly, it was The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby that robbed us of the chance of the first really strong female character in an Iron Man film. The trilogy was okay, but her Maya Hansen could have been a lot more.