Highlights
- Gwen Stefani almost landed Angelina Jolie’s role in Mr. and Mrs. Smith. She went to multiple auditions and was a top contender.
- Stefani chose to prioritize her music career over acting.
- Other actresses considered for Angelina Jolie’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith role were Nicole Kidman, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Cate Blanchett, but ultimately Jolie was chosen.
Gwen Stefani revealed that she almost landed Angelina Jolie’s role in Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
During a 2016 interview on The Howard Stern Show, the singer explained that she was nearly cast as Jane Smith, one-half of the married spy team in Mr. and Mrs. Smith. “I feel like I almost got it,” the singer told Stern. “I went to a bunch [of auditions].”
“[It was] very competitive and I wanted to do it, but I wanted to do music more,” revealed Gwen Stefani.
Back in April 2008, the No Doubt singer told Vogue that the role came down to her and Angelina Jolie. Mr. and Mrs. Smith will go down in celebrity history after Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie started their affair on set.
“It was between me and Angelina Jolie, and I’m like, ‘Oh, great. I got a shot here,” The Voice judge she told. “The whole acting thing really feels like something I could do. Whenever I’ve done it, whenever I had moments where it works, it’s just like performing. You hit a moment. And that’s what movies are: a series of moments.”
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Gwen Stefani spoke to Ellen Degeneres about losing out on the role of Jane Smith in Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
“What movie role have you auditioned for that people would be surprised to know?” DeGeneres asked, to which Stefani responded: “Mr. and Mrs. Smith: Angelina beat me.”
After Ellen’s studio audience gasped, Stefani joked that the film “would’ve been a different story” if she had starred alongside Brad Pitt. The movie featured an unhappily married couple who lead double lives as deadly assassins.
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“That could have gone a whole different way,” Degeneres remarked. “Talk about sliding doors.” Gwen Stefani’s then-husband Gavin Rossdale was good friends with Brad Pitt, helping her land an audition for the role.
Jennifer Aniston and Pitt divorced the year of the film’s release. Both Pitt and Jolie confirmed their romantic connection was formed on the set of the action film.
Angelina Jolie admitted in a 2006 interview with Vogue, “We just became kind of a pair. And it took until, really, the end of the shoot for us, I think, to realise that it might mean something more than we’d earlier allowed ourselves to believe.”
Producers of Mr. & Mrs. Smith wanted two Hollywood names to play a “believable married couple,” and “action stars.” They originally wanted Nicole Kidman to play the role, but scheduling conflicts for The Stepford Wives prevented her from taking the role.
Catherine Zeta-Jones and Cate Blanchett were also considered for the role of Jane Smith. Johnny Depp and Will Smith were also considered for the role of assassin John Smith.
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Gwen Stefani’s Acting Career
Although she didn’t land the coveted role in Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Gwen Stefani has dipped her toe into the world of film and TV. Back in 2004, the ‘What You Waiting For’ singer appeared alongside Leonardo DiCaprio in the movie The Aviator, playing the real-life actress Jean Harlow.
Stefani revealed back in 2004 that she found acting harder than performing on stage but admitted she’d like to take on more acting gigs.
“It’s not as theatrical, it’s a lot more subtle, and that’s a lot harder. Simpler is usually harder. So I would love to do more. I got my feet wet, but I would love to go swimming.”
Gwen Stefani’s on-screen career also saw her appear as herself in movies like Zoolander and TV shows like Dawson’s Creek, Gossip Girl and King of The Hill. More recently, she voiced DJ Suki in the 2016 animated movie, Trolls.
How Gwen Stefani Landed The Role In The Aviator
Gwen Stefani starred in the 2004 Howard Hughes biopic The Aviator. The ‘Cool’ singer portrayed Jean Harlow, who starred in Hughes’ 1930 aviation drama Hell’s Angels.
Five months after she expressed her interest in playing the blonde bombshell in the Martin Scorsese movie, she had an audition. “My stomach was on the floor,” Stefani said. “It’s totally humiliating to walk in and have to try out. They know who you are, but it’s a casting call thing.”
The singer tried to calm her nerves by telling herself that the part was so small. “But let’s face it, there’s never a small part in a Martin Scorsese film,” she admitted. Luckily, she had advice from the people running the casting call, who gave her tips on how to act and dress during the audition.
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“They told me, ‘Don’t dress like a rock star, you have to dress up nice,’” the singer explained. “They couldn’t have been more helpful and wanting me to get it. These casting girls let me do it a million times, but I left there with sweat.”
When Gwen Stefani returned to the audition, she came face to face with Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese. It didn’t help that she could hear other actresses auditioning in the room next door. “It was really awkward,” she said. “And all these other girls were coming out of there going, ‘Oh, God!’”
Despite her concerns and nerves, Stefani landed the role “[Scorsese] gave me my first role in a major film, Howard Hughes gave Jean Harlow her first big lead role.” She sent the Raging Bull director flowers and a note thanking him for giving her the role. The American biopic also starred Kate Beckinsale, Ian Holm Willem Dafoe, and Cate Blanchett, who won an Academy Award for playing Katherine Hepburn.
Source: NewsFinale
