Acting is a competitive business. Behind every role in all the best movies, is a laundry list of other possibilities. Christian Bale, prolific Batman actor and action movie star, even feels like second fiddle sometimes, as he says he’s only where he is because Leonardo DiCaprio turns stuff down.
In a profile from GQ, Bale elaborated on him losing films to DiCaprio, saying that it’s every actor of their generation, too. “It’s not just me. Look, to this day, any role that anybody gets, it’s only because he’s passed on it beforehand,” he says. “It doesn’t matter what anyone tells you. It doesn’t matter how friendly you are with the directors.”
Bale contends that he’s heard this first-hand from people that he’s collaborated with multiple times, just proving the sheer star-power that rests on DiCaprio’s shoulders. “I had one of those people actually tell me that,” he says. “So, thank you, Leo, because literally, he gets to choose everything he does. And good for him, he’s phenomenal.”
One of the roles Bale famously lost out on was romance movie Titanic. Obviously a monumental Hollywood picture, Bale considers it a blessing, because he wouldn’t like the same attention DiCaprio has since courted around the world.
“Do you know how grateful I am to get any damn thing? I mean, I can’t do what he does,” Bale muses. “I wouldn’t want the exposure that he has either. And he does it magnificently.” Leonardo DiCaprio is one of the most well-known actors ever, and anything he’s in tends to have its moment in the public eye, whether Netflix movies like Don’t Look Up or drama movies such as Once Upon A Time In Hollywood.
Bale has enjoyed good innings in superhero movies regardless, and he’s currently in thriller movie Amsterdam, in theatres now.