Forbes Magazine has compiled a list of actors and the iconic roles they turned down.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Denzel Washington revealed that he had been offered the role of Detective David Mills in the 1995 thriller Seven, but he turned it down because he thought the film was “too dark” — and came to regret it. The part, of course, wound up going to Brad Pitt, who starred opposite Morgan Freeman, Kevin Spacey and Pitt’s then girlfriend Gwyneth Paltrow, and Seven took in $327million at the box office and helped establish Pitt as an actor. Washington told EW, “They offered me the Brad Pitt part, but I was like, ‘This is so dark and evil.’

“Then, when I saw the movie, I was like, ‘Oh, shoot.’”

Things might have been very different for both actors and for the studio if Washington had taken the role. Or maybe they wouldn’t. Who can say?

Would audiences have reacted the same way to the reality twister, The Matrix, if Will Smith hadn’t turned down the role of Neo? What if Molly Ringwald had played the hooker with a heart of gold in Pretty Woman? Would Brokeback Mountain still be Brokeback Mountain if the lead roles had gone to Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg? How about Burt Reynolds as Han Solo? Interestingly, it appears that Harrison Ford wasn’t the first choice for either of the two major roles for which he is best known.

On Forbes’ list of actors and the roles they turned down are:

Denzel Washington, Detective David Mills, Seven. Went to: Brad Pitt.
Will Smith, Neo, The Matrix. Went to: Keanu Reeves.
Jennifer Connelly, Rachel Keller, The Ring. Went to: Naomi Watts
Sammy Davis Jr., Betelgeuse, Beetlejuice. Went to: Michael Keaton.
Shirley Temple, Dorothy Gale, The Wizard of Oz. Went to: Judy Garland.
Nicole Kidman, Hannah Schmitz, The Reader. Went to: Kate Winslet.
Bette Midler, Annie Wilkes, Misery. Went to: Kathy Bates.
Sarah Polley, Penny Lane, Almost Famous. Went to: Kate Hudson
Burt Reynolds, Han Solo, Star Wars. Went to: Harrison Ford.
Debra Winger, Alex Forrest, Fatal Attraction. Went to: Glenn Close.
John Travolta, Forrest Gump, Forrest Gump. Went to: Tom Hanks.
Molly Ringwald, Vivian Ward, Pretty Woman. Went to: Julia Roberts
Mark Wahlberg and Joaquin Phoenix, Brokeback Mountain. Went to: Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal.
Tom Selleck, Indiana Jones, Raiders of the Lost Ark. Went to: Harrison Ford.

It’s not always easy being a famous teen. Irish actress Saoirse Ronan quit school because of unkind treatment, not just from fellow students but, surprisingly,  from grown ups as well.

Ronan, 15, who received a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her role in Atonement and who currently stars in Peter Jackson’s film adaptation of Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones, says the staff and students at Kilkenny College, a Protestant boarding school, gave her a “hard time” about her fame. And so she left.

“The reason was teachers giving me a hard time. Teachers and students.” She explained in an interview with The Guardian. “Some of the students were, you know, mean. But I only stayed a while. It wasn’t really working out. You know, the school is a good school and the people who go there are good people. But when your schoolmates recognise you before they’ve met you, and the teachers do, too, it can make things very awkward and difficult. It’s a shame.”

Ronan is now home schooled but unwanted attention isn’t limited to the classroom and she finds herself having to cope with that downside of celebrity on a regular basis.

“I find that hard to deal with, though I don’t have it as bad as the Twilight people or the Harry Potter kids. But it is weird, especially after doing a film like this one. If I notice that a guy is looking at me — a man — I think, ‘Is this a really weird guy staring at me, or does he just recognise me from a film?’”

Liam Neeson has dropped out of a movie about the saint who brought Christianity to Scotland, citing his grief over the death of his wife Natasha Richardson last year.

According to Starpulse, the actor was set to star alongside Jeremy Irons in a film by Scottish director Norman Stone about legendary historical figure Saint Columba. But Stone says Neeson has left the project.

Richardson passed away in March of last year following a skiing accident at Mt. Tremblant in Quebec. After her sudden death, Stone gave the actor several months to decide whether he wanted to continue with the role but Neeson reportedly felt he couldn’t go ahead.

Stone says, “It has been a difficult time for Liam. I think he would have been great in the film. We wanted him to play the part of King Aidan, who has fiery clashes with Columba (Irons). It would’ve been great to see him alongside Jeremy.

“The script was with him for several months and I understand he loved it. He has decided not to go ahead, which is a pity, but the decision was made after what has been a difficult time for him and I respect the circumstances. He is a truly great actor.”

Neeson plays Zeus in Clash of the Titans, which is scheduled for release in March. He is also set to play Lincoln in Steven Spielberg’s film of the same name and has reportedly been cast as John ‘Hannibal’ Smith in the A-Team remake.

Kristen Stewart was left a little worse for the wear after shooting a pole dancing scene for the upcoming film Welcome to the Rileys.

The actress plays a 16-year-old stripper/prostitute in the drama, directed by Jake Scott, son of acclaimed director Ridley Scott. Rileys, which is debuting at the Sundance Film Festival, also stars James Gandolfini as the married man who has lost his teenage daughter and takes a fatherly interest in Stewart’s character, and Melissa Leo as his agoraphobic wife.

Stewart told E! Online that she was not prepared for the physically demanding stripper scenes. She said, “I did some pole dancing. I got bruises all over my legs. I tore myself up doing it. It sucked.” But it wasn’t all bad. She added, “The more I saw it, the more I wanted it. It was like a weird self-hating kind of thing.”

Scott hooked Kristen up with a professional stripper to learn the ropes. “She’s like one of the best in the business,” he said. “So she was really reliable and didn’t do drugs or anything like that, but she was able to introduce Kristen to girls that were. She was able to put her in that world.”

The Twilight star was still scared, however. “She was terrified,” Scott added. “The strip club we shot in was really a club, and it really was that dirty and really that tough. But she killed it.”

Stewart, however, insists that her character is “not sultry and she is not sexy.”

Scott confirms, explaining, “This is not about a stripper. It’s about a damaged child.”

Avatar will likely make history yet again today (Monday) as it sails past Titanic and becomes the biggest grossing movie in history – not accounting for ticket price inflation. After you take this into account the movie sits only at number 34 on the box office list.

The Los Angeles Times says James Cameron’s 3D blockbuster ruled the box office for the sixth weekend in a row, taking in $107 million overseas, combined with $36 million in the U.S. and Canada, bringing its worldwide total to $1.841 billion, just $2 million short of the $1.843-billion world-record gross set by Titanic in 1998. It will easily pass this mark on Monday.

The Times points out that, with 12 years of ticket price inflation and surcharges on the vast majority of screens where moviegoers are seeing the new film in 3D, Avatar still lags far behind Titanic in attendance. And to put things further into perspective, last week reports were that, after taking inflation and other factors into account, Avatar is actually only 34th on the highest grossing list. Film site Box Office Mojo lists the top films and the number one is Gone with the Wind, released in 1939. This is followed by Star Wars (1977), The Sound of Music (1965), E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982), The Ten Commandments (1956) rounds out the top five and Titanic is number 6, well ahead of Avatar.

The Times says that ticket sales are on the decline for Avatar, falling 25% or less in every major market except China, where ticket sales fell 34% after the government unexpectedly yanked it off every 2D screen where it was playing, leaving it only in 3D locations.

Forget reports that Twilight’s Kellan Lutz is to be cast in the Conan the Barbarian remake. That talk is over, according to Mike Fleming at Deadline Hollywood, and the actor who plays Emmett Cullen is officially out of the running, bested by Jason Momoa.

Momoa is best known for his role as Ronon Dex on television’s Stargate Atlantis.

The search for Conan was narrowed down to three actors: Lutz, Momoa and Supernatural’s Jared Padalecki, the latter of whom was eventually dropped from the running. Deadline reports that director Marcus Nispel was sold on Momoa, and won over the filmmakers by shooting a few trial scenes with the actor wielding a sword.

In related news, Latino Review is reporting that the role of Conan’s father, Corin, has been offered to The Wrestler star Mickey Rourke.

Conan is set for a March 15 production start in Bulgaria.

Meanwhile, Kellan Lutz will appear in the third Twilight movie, Eclipse, as well as in the Nightmare on Elm Street reboot, which stars Jackie Earle Haley as Freddy Krueger.

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That remake of A Star is Born might have found a director and some names are being bandied about for the lead roles, including Robert Downey Jr. And Alicia Keys.

Deadline Hollywood says Nick Cassavetes is in early talks with Warner Bros to direct what will be the fourth adaptation of the showbiz love story between a star on the way down and an ingenue on the rise.

Cassavetes, son of filmmaker John Cassavetes, has helmed several movies, including 2004’s The Notebook and 2009’s My Sister’s Keeper.

There have been three previous versions of Star. The first was in 1937 and starred Janet Gaynor and Norman Maine. The second, in 1954, featured Judy Garland and James Mason. And the third was in 1976 and featured Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson. The latest remake has been in gestation for some time and back in September it was reported that Will Fetters had been hired to write a scripted of which a number of others had already penned drafts, including Ali writers Stephen Rivele and Christopher Wilkinson, as well as Reggie Rock Bythewood, who penned the Biggie Smalls biopic, Notorious.

Beyonce’s name has been connected to the lead and, at one point, the studio reportedly hoped to pair the R&B star with Will Smith. Beyonce is still on the wish list, says Deadline, along with Alicia Keyes and Rihanna. Names tipped as possibles for the male lead include Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Hamm.

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Nine films are still in the running for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. As expected, the Golden Globe winner from Germany, The White Ribbon, by Michael Hanake is among them, as is France’s A Prophet by Jacques Audiard.

Screen Daily notes that the omission of South Korea’s widely admired entry, Bong Joon-ho’s Mother, is a surprise. And Entertainment Weekly muses that Spain’s Pedro Almodovar may get some satisfaction out of seeing the list – Almodovar’s acclaimed Broken Embraces was not chosen as Spain’s official entry and the film that they did choose, The Dancer and the Thief, failed to make the cut.

The final five nominees will be announced on February 2.

The shortlisted films in alphabetical order by country are:

El Secreto De Sus Ojos (Argentina). Juan Jose Campanella

Samson & Delilah (Australia). Warwick Thornton

The World Is Big And Salvation Lurks Around The Corner (Bulgaria). Stephan Komandarev

A Prophet (France). Jacques Audiard

The White Ribbon (Germany). Michael Haneke

Ajami (Israel). Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani

Kelin (Kazakhstan). Ermek Tursunov

Winter In Wartime (The Netherlands). Martin Koolhoven

The Milk Of Sorrow (Peru). Claudia Llosa

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A book co-authored by James Frey is set to be made into a movie with Michael Bay producing and D.J. Caruso directing.

The Hollywood Reporter says D.J. Caruso — director of ‘Disturbia’ (which starred Shia LaBoeuf trying to catch his murdering neighbour) and ‘The Salton Sea’ (which starred Val Kilmer as a speed freak on a revenge mission) — will helm ‘I Am Number Four,’ based on an upcoming young-adult science fiction book by James Frey and Jobie Hughes.

According to The New York Times, ‘I Am Number Four’ is about a group of nine alien teenagers on a planet called Lorien. When Lorien is attacked by a hostile race from another planet, the nine and their guardians evacuate to Earth, with the predators still in pursuit. Three aliens are killed and the protagonist, a Lorien boy named John Smith, hides in Paradise, Ohio, disguised as a human, trying to evade the hunters and knowing he is next on their list.

The book is the first in a series of six to be published by HarperCollins Children’s books, beginning in the fall. In June, it was reported in the NY Times that Frey — who famously embellished details in his drug recovery “memoir,” ‘A Million Little Pieces’ — was shopping the book around anonymously. He was revealed as the co-author a week later.

DreamWorks picked up film rights in June and Michael Bay is attached to produce. ‘Smallville’ creators Al Gough and Miles Millar wrote the screenplay.

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John Landis, director of  ‘An American Werewolf in London’ and Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ video is working on his first feature film in over ten years.

Simon Pegg will star in the horror comedy ‘Burke and Hare,’ and it has just been announced that we will be joined on screen by Isla Fisher, Andy Serkis and Tom Wilkinson.

‘Burke and Hare’ is based on the true story of a pair of 19th Century serial killers in Edinburgh, Scotland. Irish immigrants, William Burke and William Hare, were grave robbers who lucratively sold corpses to anatomy lecturer Dr. Robert Knox for dissection. They eventually discovered that they could actually collect more bodies if they killed people rather limit themselves to digging them up and are believed to have committed 17 murders between the years 1827 and 1828.

Simon Pegg will play Burke and Andy Serkis is Hare. Isla Fisher is reportedly to play Burke’s girlfriend, whose name was Helen M’Dougal. Wilkinson will play Knox.

Landis’s filmography includes ‘National Lampoon’s Animal House’ (1978), ‘The Blues Brothers’ (1980), ‘Trading Places’ (1983), ‘¡Three Amigos!’ (1986) and ‘Blues Brothers 2000′ (1998). His last feaure film was ‘Susan’s Plan’ in 1998.

Fisher most recently appeared in Disney’s ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic.’

Serkis, who is best known for his role as Gollum in the ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy was shortlisted for a best actor Bafta nomination this week for his portrayal of singer Ian Dury in ‘Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll.’

Wilkinson stars in the forthcoming Polanski thriller ‘The Ghost Writer,’ and recently completed work on Michel Gondry’s ‘The Green Hornet.’

Simon Pegg is best known for his roles in Zombie spoof ‘Shaun of the Dead’ and ‘Star Trek,’ in which he played Scotty.

‘Burke and Hare’ begins shooting at the end of January in Edinburgh and London.

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