Mark Strong plays a really good bad guy. He has appeared in a ton of movies over the last few years including SHERLOCK HOLMES, JOHN CARTER, KICK ASS, and STARDUST. He has also played non-villains in TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY, ZERO DARK THIRTY, and more, but he tends to focus on unlikeable characters. If you see his name in the credits, you are safe to assume he is going to be yelling at someone or shooting them a piercing glare. Strong automatically ups the quality of the movies he is featured in.
With that in mind, I don’t know why the producers on A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD did not try every conceivable method to cast Strong as the bad guy. The movie was mediocre at best and that could have been flipped if they had an actor strong enough to follow in the footsteps of Alan Rickman or Jeremy Irons. Strong was recently interviewed by Getty Images Entertainment where he shared he was pursued for a role in one of the recent DIE HARD movies.
“The phone went… I picked it up, he said, ‘Hi, it’s Bruce… Bruce Willis!’ I didn’t believe it at first. I thought it was ridiculous. I wondered how he got my number for a start as I don’t know him. But we had a chat, he said he had a script that he wanted to make, that he liked, and Fox had a script they liked and they were trying to make the two things into one and he was interested in meeting me so would I be interested… so I said yeah. I told him to keep me up to date with it and then he called again and we had another chat about it but then it just got away from us and dates didn’t work and I’d committed to something else… so I couldn’t do it… but it’s an iconic role isn’t it, the villain in a Die Hard movie?”
Talk about a let down. Strong may not have been able to do much in terms of the shitty screenplay for the recent DIE HARD movies, but he could have turned in a stellar, over the top performance, that would have at least injected a little life into the franchise. Strong indicated he would be open to playing a villain in the inevitable sequel to A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD.
You hear that, Willis? Call him again!
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