[Movies] Sacha Baron Cohen Turned Down Django Unchained For Les Miserables Posted by Joseph Lee on 01.07.2013
It was only one scene...
In an interview with Deadline, Sacha Baron Cohen revealed that he turned down Django Unchained to do Les Miserables. The scene he would have had ended up being cut from the film.
On being cast in Django Unchained: "I was editing The Dictator and we were very close to release and Paramount wouldn't push the date. And then I knew I'd have to jump straight from there into Les Mis and it basically became a choice of either pulling out of Les Mis or pulling out of Django. I'm sure Django is an incredible movie, but it was essentially one scene."
On what the character would have been: "It was a character by the name of Scotty who Leonardo DiCaprio's character plays a poker game with. The stakes become Scotty's slave girl, Broomhilda."
On how he became involved with Les Miserables: "Actually, I only have a history with Les Mis in that when I came out of university at age 20 or 21, I went through an open audition for the chorus in Les Mis; not even one of the named roles. And there were about 300 people who were lining up outside the Palace Theater in the West End and I passed the first audition which was singing and then they had a group audition for dancing and they taught a little routine. I had no idea how to learn choreographed steps and so I just decided to freestyle and came to the actual audition. There were seven people doing perfectly choreographed steps and then me just doing some very bad breakdancing in the corner and I did not get the role. So, there is a history."
