We Might By no means Know the Fact About Matt Damon and James Cameron’s Foolish ‘Avatar’ Beef

Neither Matt Damon nor James Cameron is hurting for wealth or fame, so their well mannered public disagreement over Damon’s supposed near-miss with Cameron’s Avatar franchise is already fairly foolish to think about. The one factor that traces up with their tales is that sooner or later throughout Cameron’s multi-year means of placing collectively the primary Avatar movie, he thought Damon could be a superb match for the lead function.

The Hollywood Reporter surfaced a two-year-old video of Damon explaining, “Jim Cameron provided me 10 p.c of Avatar,” and—in a type of “Will Smith talks about passing on The Matrix” type of means—that “you’ll by no means meet an actor who turned down more cash than me.”

To listen to Damon inform it, he needed to say “no” as a result of on the time he was dedicated to “the Bourne film.” The primary installment in that sequence, The Bourne Id, was launched in 2002; Damon additionally starred in installments that hit theaters in 2004 and 2007 forward of Avatar‘s 2009 launch.

He recalled Cameron as being “beautiful” and saying to him, “This film doesn’t really want you; it doesn’t want a film star in any respect.” (Sam Worthington was finally solid as essential character Jake Sully.)

And he doubled down on the cash element, reiterating that Cameron promised him “10 p.c of the film” if he agreed. Avatar, after all, went on to earn practically $3 billion worldwide, nonetheless a record-setting quantity; the primary sequel, The Method of Water, racked up well over $2 billion, and Fireplace and Ash seems so as to add to the pile when it opens December 19.

Nonetheless, Cameron tells THR he has a distinct reminiscence of that long-ago dialog.

“He was by no means provided the half,” Cameron stated. There was a cellphone name the place they mentioned their shared need to work collectively, however Avatar wasn’t going to suit the invoice due to Damon’s Bourne scheduling conflicts, and Cameron recalled that it ended there.

“Now what he’s carried out is he’s extrapolated ‘I get 10 p.c of the gross on all my movies’… if, in his thoughts, that’s what it could’ve taken for him to do it, then it wouldn’t have occurred.”

Nonetheless, Cameron at the least views Damon’s story with amusement, saying with the report now set straight in Cameron’s thoughts, Damon “doesn’t must beat himself up anymore” in regards to the profitable payday he believes he missed out on. Additionally, for what it’s value, Cameron stated he’d nonetheless like to work with Damon on a future challenge sometime.

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