Martin Scorsese is one of the most revered filmmakers in the world. For nearly half a century, Scorsese has been regularly directing movies that rank among the greatest ever made, from Taxi Driver to Raging Bull to Goodfellas.
With screen legends like Robert De Niro and Leonardo DiCaprio in his company of recurring actors, Scorsese’s movies tend to feature fantastic performances, some of which have won Academy Awards. But the actors who end up playing major roles in Scorsese’s movies aren’t always the first choice.
5 Howard Hughes In The Aviator
Perfectly Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio
One of Scorsese’s few non-crime-related biopics, The Aviator, tells the larger-than-life life story of Howard Hughes, a movie director, business tycoon, and record-setting pilot. Leonardo DiCaprio gives an impeccable performance as Hughes, bringing grounded pathos to his eccentric personality.
If Jamie Foxx’s turn as Ray Charles hadn’t been so incredible in the same year, DiCaprio would’ve been a shoo-in for the Academy Award for Best Actor.
Almost Cast: Warren Beatty
According to the book Tales from Development Hell by David Hughes, Warren Beatty planned to direct and star in his own Howard Hughes biopic as far back as the 1970s.
After collaborating with regular Scorsese screenwriter Paul Schrader didn’t work out, Beatty wrote a script with Bo Goldman, who later penned his own Hughes movie, Melvin and Howard. Beatty eventually wrote, directed, and starred as Hughes in a movie called Rules Don’t Apply in 2016, but it bombed at the box office.
4 Henry Hill In Goodfellas
Perfectly Cast: Ray Liotta
What makes Goodfellas such a quintessential cautionary tale about life in organized crime is the inner conflicts of its lead character, Henry Hill, based on a real gangster-turned-informant. Henry wants the glamor of the mob’s way of life, but finds himself woefully unprepared for the gruesome dirty work that pays for that lifestyle.
Ray Liotta played Henry as an uncharacteristically vulnerable mafioso, taking audiences with him every step of the way as he gets in over his head, succumbs to addiction, and ultimately rats out all his closest friends just to keep his head above the water.
Almost Cast: Tom Cruise
While Scorsese wanted Liotta to play Henry from the beginning, the studio was hoping for a bigger star to anchor their movie. According to The A.V. Club, they suggested Tom Cruise to producer Irwin Winkler.
Cruise had previously worked with Scorsese on The Color of Money, one of the director’s most underrated efforts, but his ultra-confident A-lister charisma wasn’t right for Henry.
3 Charlie In Mean Streets
Perfectly Cast: Harvey Keitel
Robert De Niro first worked with Scorsese on Mean Streets. He played a carefree young criminal named Johnny Boy and shared terrific chemistry with Harvey Keitel. Keitel’s Charlie offers a dramatic counterpoint to Johnny Boy’s reckless behavior as the much more sensible friend burdened with cleaning up his messes.
While De Niro gets to have fun playing Johnny Boy as a wild, irresponsible youth, Keitel anchors the movie with an intimate study of an Italian-American mobster’s struggle with Catholic guilt.
Almost Cast: Jon Voight
Scorsese wrote the role of Charlie specifically for Keitel, who had previously starred in the director’s debut feature Who’s That Knocking at My Door, but according to the AFI, the financial backers wanted Jon Voight.
Thanks to the success of Deliverance, Voight was a huge star at the time. As soon as Voight turned down the part of Charlie, Scorsese cast Keitel before the financiers could suggest another big-name actor.
2 Bill The Butcher In Gangs Of New York
Perfectly Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis
Before retiring with his final performance in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread, Daniel Day-Lewis was nominated for six Oscars and won half of them. Day-Lewis’ performance as Bill “the Butcher” Cutting in Scorsese’s crime epic Gangs of New York may have lost Best Actor to Adrien Brody’s turn in The Pianist, but it holds up as one of his strongest performances.
Day-Lewis’ performance as Bill the Butcher – an unscrupulous, narrow-minded powermonger early in the course of American history – feels like a trial run for his career-defining turn in P.T.A.’s There Will Be Blood.
Almost Cast: Robert De Niro
As great as Day-Lewis is in Gangs of New York, he wasn’t the first choice to play Bill the Butcher. According to The Guardian, Scorsese’s go-to leading man Robert De Niro was originally cast in the role, but he dropped out to star in The Score with Edward Norton.
De Niro must’ve been really taken with the script for The Score, because he doesn’t have a longer or stronger working relationship with any director besides Scorsese. Before De Niro turned down Gangs of New York, he and Scorsese had collaborated on three movies in the ‘70s, two in the ‘80s, and three in the ‘90s.
1 Travis Bickle In Taxi Driver
Perfectly Cast: Robert De Niro
De Niro has given so many incredible performances in Scorsese movies that it’s tough to name just one as the best. The raw honesty of his portrayal of boxer Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull deservingly won De Niro an Oscar and the actor brought all kinds of dimensions to hitman Frank Sheeran across The Irishman’s decades-long story timeline.
But arguably De Niro’s finest acting in a Scorsese movie – or at least his most iconic – is his turn as Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver. Instead of leaning into the pulpy vigilante aspects of the character, De Niro played Travis as a quintessential portrait of loneliness.
Almost Cast: Dustin Hoffman
Since De Niro had just worked with Scorsese on Mean Streets, it might’ve seemed like a no-brainer to give him the lead role in Taxi Driver. But Scorsese considered a few Hollywood leading men to play Travis before De Niro was cast.
One of those actors was Dustin Hoffman, according to WhatCulture, who turned it down after meeting with the director: “I remember meeting Martin Scorsese. He had no script and I didn’t even know who he was. I hadn’t seen any of his films and he talked a mile a minute telling me what the movie would be about. I was thinking, ‘What is he talking about?’ I thought the guy was crazy! The film was Taxi Driver.”
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