Courtney Lovesays she was fired from the lead female role inFight Clubafter rejectingBrad Pitt’s pitch relating to her late husband,Kurt Cobain.
“I went nuclear,” Love recalled of her reaction to Pitt’s suggestion, saying that she told the actor, now 59, " ‘Who the f— do you think are?’ "
Love said then-boyfriendEdward Norton, who co-ledFight Clubwith Pitt, broke the news to her that she would no longer be costarring with the two of them. “He starts sobbing. … And he was like, ‘I don’t have the power!’ " she said.
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Helena Bonham Carter and Edward Norton inFight Club(1999).20th Century Fox/Kobal/Shutterstock
Love said that more than two decades later, “I still kick myself for not having the shark instinct to be like, ‘Sure,’ and f— ‘em later,” claiming Pitt has been pursuing a Cobain-related project since 1996.
Despite casting tensions, theHolesinger praised Bonham Carter, 56, calling her “a genius” but admitted ofFight Clubitself, “I’ve never seen that film.”
Love went on to say that she and Pitt spoke about the possibility of a Cobain project in 2020, when they had a Zoom call about Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment potentially producing abiopic about the late grunge legend. But, as she claimed she told Pitt, " ‘I don’t know that I trust you and I don’t know that your movies are for profit.’ "
“They’re really good social-justice movies, but … I was like, ‘If you don’t get me, you kind of don’t get Kurt, and I don’t feel like you do, Brad,’ " Love said.
Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love in 1992.Lindsay Brice/Getty Images
The initial negative reception to the film came as a surprise at the time to Pitt, who said in 2020 that he recalled seeing audience members “just slowly get up from their seats and no one is talking andthey kind of disappear from the screening.”
He added during his interview on theWTF with Marc Maronpodcast, “I remember looking at Fincher and being like, ‘Oh my God,what the f— did we do? What happened?’ I thought that s— was great.” He and Fincher also worked together on the moviesSeven(1995) andThe Curious Case of Benjamin Button(2008).
LovereportedlytoldGQback in 2011 about the idea of Pitt playing Cobain in a film, “Kurt had more presence and more beauty thanBrad Pitt.” Later, in 2014,she claimed castingwas underway for a possible Cobain film and she was seeking “blond, gorgeous and the newBrad Pitts” for the part.
source: people.com
