Robert Downey Jr. wanted to play this ‘Batman’ character but Christopher Nolan wasn’t interested

Robert Downey Jr. has revealed that he had been keen to appear in Batman Begins, and even met with the movie’s director to discuss possible casting.

• READ MORE: ‘Oppenheimer’ review: Christopher Nolan’s mind-blowing biopic hits like a bomb to the brain

At a Q&A in Los Angeles, Downey Jr. shared that he had met with Christopher Nolan, with whom he would later work on Oppenheimer, and had spoken about playing the villain, Scarecrow, in the 2005 movie, starring Christian Bale as the superhero.

“I’m pretty sure I heard about [this role] and I was like ‘I’m Scarecrow,’” the actor shared, according to People. “And then I remember meeting [Nolan] for tea and I was like, ‘He doesn’t really seem like he’s really in on this interview.’”

The Iron Man actor added: “And he was polite and all that. But you can tell when someone is kind of like, “It’s not going to go anywhere.’”

The Scarecrow role instead went to Downey Jr.’s Oppenheimer co-star, Cillian Murphy, who reportedly auditioned to play Batman, with that role eventually going to Bale.

The movie, which was the first instalment in a trilogy of movies about the DC superhero, was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Cinematography. Scarecrow, who is a psychologist in Gotham City using gases to scare his victims, features in all three of the movies.

The sequel, The Dark Knight, grossed more than $1billion worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film of 2008. It received two Oscars out of eight nominations, with Heath Ledger being widely praised for his portrayal of The Joker.

Batman Begins was the first collaboration between Murphy and Nolan, before Murphy would go onto star in 2011’s Inception, 2017 war film, Dunkirk and the highly-acclaimed biopic Oppenheimer.

Elsewhere, Downey Jr. has said that he doesn’t think Margot Robbie is “getting enough credit” for Barbie.

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