Joaquin Phoenix was almost dropped from the original Gladiator movie, director says

Director Ridley Scott shared a hot behind-the-scenes moment the movie “Gladiator”.

Scott said Joaquin Phoenix nearly turned down his villainous role, Commodus, in the 2000 action film.

“He was in his prince outfit and he was saying, ‘I can’t do this.’ I said, “What?” – the director of “Gladiator” told The New York Times.

RUSSELL CROWE ALMOST QUIT GLADIATOR BECAUSE THE SCRIPT WAS “ABSOLUTELY AWESOME”

Scott added that Russell Crowe said, “It’s terribly unprofessional.”

When the director was asked, “How do you convince someone to stay” on the set, Scott said, “I can play the big brother or the dad. But I am a very good friend of Joaquin. “Gladiator was a baptism of fire for both of us early on.”

This is followed by his comments Phoenix recently dropped out of Todd Haynes’ new film as it was about to go into production.

Barry Keoghan was cast as the villain in the upcoming Gladiator II, but left the role at the last minute. Scott compared Keoghan and Phoenix.

‘JOKER FOLLY TWO’ STAR JOAQUIN PHOENIX SAYS LOSING WEIGHT FOR THE SEQUEL WAS ‘SAFE’ BUT ‘HARD’

“Barry got into Saltburn,” said Scott. “I think this is possibly the best film I’ve seen this year. Anyway, Barry is one of the good ones, on par with Joaquin Phoenix. … Barry is so complex and really in control. I know it’s a bit complicated, but it’s worth it. Like Joaquin’s choice, it was worth it.”

Representatives for Scott, Phoenix and Crowe did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

GLADIATOR STAR RUSSELL CROWE REVEALS HE’S ‘JEALOUS’ OF SEQUEL

The sequel stars Paul Mezcal as Lucius, the son of Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) from the original film, who witnessed Crowe’s hero Maximus die in the gladiatorial ring while avenging his family and taking down Commodus (Phoenix), the cruel emperor ( also uncle Lucius).

Crowe admitted last year that he almost quit Gladiator because he thought the script was “absolute rubbish”.

“My film Gladiator is my 20th film. I was confident in my abilities as the main character. What I wasn’t sure about in Gladiator was the world around me,” he told Vanity Fair at the time.

“There was a great concept behind what we were doing, but the script, it was nonsense. Absolute nonsense. And it had all these weird scenes… One of them was about chariots,” he shared.

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO THE ENTERTAINMENT NEWSLETTER

Although all the storylines were true, Crowe was worried that nothing would resonate with the audience.

“It’s just not going to sound good to today’s audience. They’ll be like, ‘What the hell is all this?'” he said.

Although Crowe almost quit Gladiator, he previously admitted that the film changed his life and was “a little jealous” of the new film.

LIKE WHAT YOU READ? CLICK HERE FOR MORE ENTERTAINMENT NEWS

“The only thing I really feel about it is a little jealousy. … Because I was a much younger man, obviously, and it was a huge experience in my life,” Crowe told Collider at the time.

“This is what really changed my life. It has changed the way people treat me and what I do for a living. … I’ve been very fortunate to be in a lot of big movies, but the legs in this movie are incredible. “

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS PROGRAM

Gladiator received 12 Oscar nominations and took home five, including Best Picture and Best Actor for Crowe.