It’s almost impossible to imagine anyone other than Leonardo Di Caprio as Jack Dawson in Titanic. It’s the role that broke a million hearts, put his face on the cover of every teen mag in the land and sent Leo’s career into the stratosphere. Oh, and it also marked the start of one of Hollywood’s most enduring (and most GIF-ed) friendships, between Leo and his co-star Kate Winslet.
It’ll come as a shock to learn, then, that that 'I’m flying!’ scene could have been very different indeed, with none other than Paul Rudd (aka. Tinseltown’s most ageless man, bar Pharrell Williams) lined up as a hopeful for the role.
Speaking on The Late Late Show with James Corden, the Clueless and Friends star explained that he had auditioned for the lead role in James Cameron’s Nineties epic.
‘I really wanted to get the part because my dad was a Titanic historian,’ he said, explaining ‘He used to take people all over the world talking about the Titanic.’ And when it came to researching the part, Rudd went all out – perhaps going a little too far…
‘I went in there talking about what steel they used and where it was built and they were like, “None of this matters!”’ he added. Sorry Paul, we’re not too bothered about metals but we’d definitely like to know the dimensions of that floating door…
It seems that Paul, who acted alongside Di Caprio in Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 adaptation of Romeo + Juliet, has no hard feelings towards Leo, joking ‘I think the guy that got it was pretty good.’ He even got a chance to recreate the film’s iconic love scene with actress Diane Lane – who also revealed that she’d unsuccessfully auditioned for Julia Roberts’ role in Pretty Woman.
We’re now imagining a world where Paul Rudd takes the Oscar for The Revenant and where Leonardo Di Caprio plays Phoebe Buffay’s husband…
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