Sometimes, you win much more in the end by losing, and Downey Jr. proved it.
It’s no one’s secret that back in 2008, it was Robert Downey Jr ’s Iron Man that started the MCU as we know it — a massive universe with dozens of interconnected movies and TV shows. Some fans joke that in reality, it was the Tony Stark actor who birthed the MCU, and to some extent, that is true: there could be none without him.
But funnily enough, Downey Jr. could only do it because he failed a couple of auditions at Marvel, first.
Downey Jr. Failed a Few Marvel Auditions
The now-iconic actor wasn’t immediately a perfect fit for Marvel’s vision. Before booking his fateful role of Tony Stark, he tried to audition for other characters — and if he’d nailed them, the MCU would’ve gone a very, very different route. At the very least, with Robert Downey Jr. being a major villain instead of a major protagonist.
“I remember [Jon Favreau and the crew] had all met with [Robert] already for like Doctor Doom or something on another project [before Iron Man]. I think he had come through on maybe Fantastic Four, so everybody sort of knew who he was,” Marvel boss Kevin Feige shared in the 2023 Iron Man: 15 Years Later YouTube special.
Can you imagine Downey Jr. as Doctor Doom? Or Iron Man played by someone else? We can’t, either. But apparently, it was a very possible scenario back then.
Downey Jr. Made the MCU Possible
As we know, 2008’s Iron Man was the start of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and that movie largely became a hit thanks to Robert Downey Jr’s charisma. Meaning, that if he’d booked the Doctor Doom part before that, the MCU would not have even existed today, in the first place. Both Feige and Favreau recognize that fact.
“He was the voice of the character. And then one by one, people were just signing on board because now it became something interesting. <…> I remember on later movies — we’ll talk about them on the 15th anniversary of those — there were dark days. And I would say to Robert, ‘We wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for you.’ Meaning, we wouldn’t have a studio if it wasn’t for him,” Favreu and Feige recalled.
Just like in the Multiverse, there might exist a parallel reality out there where Robert Downey Jr. played Doctor Doom and the MCU never took off. But that’s not our reality: ours is the one where Iron Man began the golden age of superhero movies.
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