Was Josh Hartnett Nearly Batman? Christopher Nolan Sets The Record Straight

Christian Bale's performance in Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight" trilogy is arguably one of the best portrayals of Batman, but another actor was almost chosen to wear the cape and cowl. In 2015, Josh Hartnett said he spoke to the director about the part. Now, the renowned filmmaker has officially weighed in on how close the "Black Hawk Down" star came to suiting up as Gotham's Caped Crusader.

In the box office hit "Oppenheimer," Hartnett played the role of Ernest Lawrence, a nuclear physicist who took home the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1939. But fans may not realize that despite the atomic bomb biopic being his first time in a Nolan film, the filmmaker confirmed that he was considered for Batman in the early stages. Nolan revealed he spoke to the actor but confirmed he was not offered the part, nor did things progress to the point of Hartnett doing a screen test. "I met with Josh, and if I recall, he was a young actor whose work I was very interested in," Nolan said in an interview with Josh Horowitz. "I had an initial conversation with him, but he had read my brother's script for 'The Prestige' at the time and was more interested in getting involved with that. So it never went further than that."

While he did pass on the chance to star in a more grounded take on Batman with universal acclaim, Hartnett was fortunate enough to eventually work with Nolan on "Oppenheimer." But fans perplexed by his decision not to play the role might also be surprised to learn that the Dark Knight isn't the only big-name DC character Hartnett almost got to play.

Bailing on Batman would seem like a strange career move these days, but at one point, playing a superhero in spandex was a huge roll of the dice. The comic book movie game wasn't something Josh Hartnett wanted to play even though he was offered iconic characters, including Superman.

In a 2021 interview with Mr. Porter, Hartnett revealed that he was considered for the role of the Man of Steel in 2002, and when he was given a chance to play Superman in a trilogy for a rumored $100 million payday, he decided it wasn't a great idea. "At the time, it was so obvious to me to turn it down," he said. "I was being offered movies by the very top directors, and Superman was a risk. Yes, there was a lot of money involved, but I didn't think that was the be-all and end-all." The role eventually went to Brandon Routh in the 2006 feature "Superman Returns," but the film wasn't as well-received by fans and critics compared to the reception of "The Dark Knight" trilogy, and due to an underwhelming box office return, it did not get any of the planned sequels.

Hartnett may have dodged a bullet by soaring away from a possible run in "Superman Returns," but he ultimately missed out on a career-changing opportunity by not doing Christopher Nolan's "Batman" films. Whether or not things would have fared differently for each endeavor with Hartnett in the lead role is up for debate, and it would be exciting to see how different the list of best performances of Batman and the portrayals of Superman would look if he were on either.