Yes, some actors do turn down roles they find objectionable for one reason or another. Sometimes it's the type of role. Sometimes it's because the part requires them to do things they don't want to (such as an actress refusing to do nude scenes). But often actors end up taking parts (including ones they initially refused) because they become convinced that they can do things with a role they at first didn't feel comfortable with.
Of course, most actors are usually unemployed, so they don't always have much leeway in picking and choosing their parts. Most have to take what they're offered -- including even many well-known names. Only the few at the very top can readily reject roles and not worry about it.
In 1961, when A&C began filming, George Grizzard was a young actor, and the chance to co-star in a major film with a dozen movie legends was obviously one he couldn't pass up. The fact that, as a closeted gay man, he portrayed an unscrupulous Senator blackmailing another Senator over a homosexual incident in his past, must have made the role more compelling to him.
reply
share
bradford-1
10 years ago
Of course, this film's director, Otto Preminger, was one of those Jewish expatriates who played Nazis in movies like STALAG 17 and MARGIN FOR ERROR.
May I bone your kipper, Mademoiselle?
reply
share
hobnob53
10 years ago
Exactly. I remember seeing Preminger being interviewed on The Dick Cavett Show around 1971, and Cavett was trying to recall the name of a film Preminger had acted in with Monty Woolley (it was The Pied Piper, 1942). In trying to come up with the title, Cavett said to Preminger, "You played a Nazi", at which Preminger chuckled, "Naturally -- what else would I play?!"
reply
share