10 Casting 'What Ifs' From Buffy The Vampire Slayer
3. Natasha Lyonne
Natasha Lyonne has cemented her stardom with roles in Orange Is The New Black and Russian Doll, and was emerging into the limelight in the late-1990s when, in her own words, offers were coming at her left, right and centre. Among these were, as she revealed in 2013, a role in Buffy - although which one remains a secret.
Soon after, it was hinted very strongly that Lyonne had in fact turned down the role of Buffy Summers. She talks about how she compared herself to Sarah Michelle Gellar - which surely only lends itself to one conclusion. Prior to this, there had been some debate as to what role she may have ended up taking had she accepted the offer. Some, including Slate TV critic Willa Paskin, believed that it could have been Willow.
To Lyonne's credit, part of the reason she turned down this role among others is that she wanted more control over the direction that her career was going in. In her own words, she takes to "exploring the messy, unhappy lives of young women," a trend that certainly shows in her more recent work. Lyonne's Buffy would have been markedly different, but in its own way incredibly appealing.