15 Strangest Movie Casting Rumours That Thankfully Never Happened

11. Matthew Broderick As Walter White

If you thought Bryan Cranston was the first choice to play Walter White, you would be correct. For Breaking Bad creator/writer Vince Gilligan, Cranston - with whom he had previously worked on an episode of the X-Files - was the only choice to play the show's conflicted, complicated anti-hero. Unfortunately for Gilligan and Cranston, the executives at network AMC were not as convinced that Cranston was the best choice. He had played dramatic roles before but was best known as one of the leads in family comedy Malcolm In The Middle and before that had a recurring guest role on Seinfeld. They weren't sure a comedic actor was the right man to play a wannabe drug kingpin. Who was AMC's right man? Matthew Broderick. You might remember him as a charismatic young man in War Games and Ferries Bueller's Day Off and a much less charismatic man in a lot of things you probably haven't watched (don't worry, no one has). Perhaps they wanted a man with actual experience of killing someone? Thankfully, the Inspector Gadget actor turned the role down (as did AMC's second choice, John Cusack) and Gilligan stuck to his guns, eventually convincing the suits of Cranston's worth after a viewing of the X-Files episode they had worked on together. As a result, we got an unforgettable, groundbreaking 5 seasons of television instead of a Broderick vehicle that was cancelled after half a season.