Sam Neill first came into my life when Jurassic Park was released back in the 90s. However, his filmography preceded the dinosaur movie by at least 20 years. He was already established by the time Jurassic Park came along in 1993, but you might not know that based on the original marketing.
Neill shared his memories of this period in his new memoir, Did I Ever Tell You This? “Of the main twists and turns in an unlikely career, this seemed the most unlikely of all. How on earth did that happen?” he writes. “I was racked by the usual insecurities. Why me? I’m certainly not an action hero. The idea of me going hand to hand with Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger is simply absurd. I’m more of the ordinary guy on screen. If indeed I was supposed to be that sort of action guy, I was already, I think, forty-five years old, and as always had left things about 10 or 15 years too late.”
When Universal Pictures decided to market Jurassic Park as a big-budget action movie without much to speak of in the way of star power, it only made those insecurities worse. But he and costars Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum sucked it up “set out to prove that they, with [director Steven Spielberg], could make huge blockbusters without ‘movie stars.”
"This was true enough, but I think it slightly irked us, the actors, to be reminded from time to time we were not real ‘stars.’ It also rather overlooked the well-established and highly respected careers of Laura, Jeff, and [Richard Attenborough]. As it turned out, we now know that Harrison Ford turned down the part [of Grant], so the ‘no movie star’ plan may be not entirely true. I emphasize the word ‘slightly’ because more than anything, we were all delighted to be working with Steven. And to be working on something that would be absolutely groundbreaking, as it turned out."
Harrison Ford was originally offered the lead role in Jurassic Park
First things first: I did not know that Harrison Ford turned down the role of Grant! Did everyone else know this already and I’m just behind?
Anyway, Sam Neill has a point, and it’s absolutely understandable that he would feel the way he did when Jurassic Park was being marketed. But all that is a moot point now because the movie went on to become a classic. Jurassic Park paved the way for many other blockbusters to follow, so it’s easy to let bygones be bygones.
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h/t SYFY Wire