Our Top 10 recast movie roles list continues today, with number seven on the list. We have already had a few interesting recast roles, such as Tobey Maguire getting replaced by Rafe Spall in Life of Pi and now we have another interesting recasting decision.
Stuart Townsend was originally cast
The Lord of the Rings trilogy became one of the most successful franchises ever, managing to gross almost $3bn worldwide and made global stars of some of the actors.One such actor who became a household name, is Viggo Mortensen, who played the role of Aragon.
The role of Aragon originally went to Stuart Townsend but Peter Jackson decided that he wanted to go in a different direction with the character, much to Townsend's disappointment. He said at the time, "I have no good feelings for those people in charge, I really don't. The director wanted me and then apparently thought better of it because he really wanted someone 20 years older than me and completely different."
Viggo Mortensen as Aragon in Lord of the Rings
While Viggo Mortensen went on to appear in some impressive movie roles, Stuart Townsend has not been quite so lucky, with a limited number of top roles. It would have been interesting to see how differently things would have been with Stuart Townsend as Aragon in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Viggo Mortensen broke his toe filming one of the movies
