Viggo Mortensen eventually played the ranger in the trilogy
If you're a 'Lord of the Rings' fan, you may be aware of the fact that the character of Aragorn was once offered to none other than Russell Crowe.
Crowe ultimately turned the role down, it went to Viggo Mortensen and the three films, of course, went on to become one of the biggest trilogies of all time.
However, Crowe has now revealed the reason he turned down the chance to play Aragorn, despite being a big fan of Tolkien - and says that it was basically because he felt that director Peter Jackson did not want him in the films.
In an interview with GQ, he is asked whether he regrets turning it down, and says: "I don’t actually. I very much felt the studio were making that decision, not the film director.
"And I talked to Peter Jackson over the phone, and he wasn’t saying the sort of things that directors were saying to you if they were really trying to attract you to a project. And I just kind of got a sense that he already had somebody else in mind that he wanted to do. And me stepping forward and saying yes was actually going to get in his way."
He added: "We come from the same place, so there’s a nuance in that conversation that other people might not hear - we’re both New Zealanders - in his own way, without him saying anything negative, that he had another plan. So I just left it at that.”
Mortensen was recently asked whether he would be up for playing Aragorn in the new 'Hobbit' film directed by Andy Serkis, and said "I would only do it if I was right for it in terms of, you know, the age I am now and so forth. I would only do it if I was right for the character. It would be silly to do it otherwise."
Ian McKellen, meanwhile, also mused on the possibility of reprising the role of Gandalf and said that he would be up for it "if he's still alive."