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Fri 7 August 2026 19:45, UK
One of the things Ron Howard has always done well throughout his career is casting, but it’s a lot easier to hire the right actor for a part when they actually want to do it.
For one reason or another, he’s faced some pushback. Several big-name stars laughed at the opportunity to play the lead in Splash, and the studio found the idea of Tom Hanks taking the job equally funny, but Howard was convinced he’d finally found his man, launching the former’s big-screen career in the process.
Dr Seuss’ widow was heavily involved in the development and production of How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and she was adamant that Jack Nicholson was the only person worthy and capable of bringing the green grump to life. Howard disagreed, and Jim Carrey proved that he was right.
Carrey also lobbied hard to play John Nash in A Beautiful Mind, but the Happy Days alum was convinced that Russell Crowe was the better fit, and when he delivered a ‘Best Actor’-nominated performance in a ‘Best Picture’-winning film, the ginger-haired oracle was vindicated once again.
However, what happens when everyone you’ve asked turns you down? In his first feature-length effort for five years, and the first since he made his debut with Grand Theft Auto, Howard stepped back behind the camera for 1982’s Night Shift, but the biggest obstacle was finding anyone to play Bill Blazejowski.
The character, a roguish motormouth who convinces his new colleague to start running an escort service out of a brothel, was a tough nut to crack. Howard didn’t have to try too hard to find his other lead, Chuck Lumley, with his long-time friend and collaborator, Henry Winkler, on board, but the other half of the picture’s central double-act was beginning to feel like a lost cause.
“We had tried to get the late John Belushi, tried to get Dan Aykroyd and Bill Murray, talked to John Candy,” the two-time Academy Award winner remembered. “And they didn’t want to do it, or thought the part was too small. But I thought it was a great part.” That’s all well and good, but nobody else did.
Further reading: Cutting Room Floor
Turning his eye away from established stars, co-writer Lowell Ganz suggested a relatively unknown TV actor called Michael Keaton, saying, he was “going to be a star for somebody, and he might be a star for us.” Howard wasn’t convinced, believing Keaton was “just a bit too frenetic” for his liking, but he gave him a chance anyway.
Hiring the wrong person for Blazejowski could have been Night Shift‘s undoing, and in retrospect, the director was thrilled at how Keaton “did a good job of keeping that character from being completely obnoxious.” So thrilled, in fact, that he cast him as the lead in Gung Ho and The Paper, too, even if he regrets their paths not crossing since.
