I’m not sure Tom Hardy will ever become a household name. If he were already I don’t think I’d be as nervous for the box office prospects as I am for Mad Max: Fury Road, which looks balls-to-the-wall insane and a movie I’m counting the minutes until my press screening next week, though at the same time nervous general audiences won’t rush to support. That said, what it would take for Hardy to become a household name is probably a career path that would result in Tom Hardy no longer being the Tom Hardy we all know and love.
While Hardy may have played a major role in Christopher Nolan‘s The Dark Knight Rises, I would wager the majority of people unfamiliar with his face don’t even realize he’s the same actor starring in the new Mad Max film or even the actor that played Eames in Nolan’s Inception, and these are huge films. As for his other, more notable performances, few saw The Drop, even fewer saw Locke and even fewer yet saw Bronson.
However, if you’re someone that frequents movie websites such as this one you’re probably drooling over all those films I just mentioned and anxiously awaiting the likes of Mad Max: Fury Road, Legend, The Revenant, Rocketman (we’re he’ll play Elton John) and The True American for Kathryn Bigelow while at the same time cursing the fact Hardy had to drop out of David Ayer‘s DC Comics adaptation Suicide Squad as he was to play Rick Flagg, the leader of the titular, Dirty Dozen-esque villains.
What exactly caused Hardy to drop out and eventually be replaced by Joel Kinnaman (RoboCop)? Speaking with Collider, Hardy had the following to say about the situation:
“Warner Bros. is my home studio and I love them so I was really bummed out. I wanted to work on that and I know the script is really fucking alley and I also know what’s gonna happen with The Joker and Harley Quinn in that; I won’t give away too much…it’s fucking alley. And that whole territory is something that I would certainly–I mean, everybody loves The Joker. Everybody loves The Joker. Will Smith is a dope guy, but everybody loves The Joker and that’s gonna, I think, be a very important film for fans.
“There’s a very practical element as to why I’ve missed out on that foray, which is because Alejandro [G. Inarritu] has overshot by three months in Calgary, so we’ve got to go back out to Patagonia or Alaska to continue shooting The Revenant, which has turned into a much bigger beast than we thought, but that also looks exceptional.
“Literally we wrapped in Calgary for now until we go back in July. It would have smashed the two, I would’ve had a beard. It was just not gonna happen so I got ass-slammed technically out of Suicide Squad, gutted, so I had to hand it over to Joel Kinnaman, who will do an amazing job. It’s just I got bumped out, and that’s cool that’s the way it is.”
“Alley”! Man, I don’t know if that’s a common bit of slang anywhere other than in Hardy’s headspace, but I love it. I’ve never heard the word used in such terms, but it’s clear how he intends it to be interpreted. I also don’t really know why he added “technically” after “ass-slammed”, but I love it. The only shame is Collider doesn’t have the interview audio posted online.
Elsewhere on the site, they also asked Hardy if he’d be interested in any other superhero movies to which he said, “I want The Punisher… I want The Punisher, or Splinter Cell, I want something… I don’t know what I want.”
As for the Splinter Cell talk, that pic is actually in development with Doug Liman (Edge of Tomorrow) directing, but there hasn’t been much word on it since last June. Hardy does note, however, “I’m not big enough to be The Punisher, I’m 5’9″,” though I think if he was up for the role Marvel might make an exception if they were to take a third stab at bringing the character to theaters.
