Many times, the work of major actors in movies does not make it into the final cut for a number of reasons. Let's look back at some of these cases.

It takes months, or even years, of hard work from producers, directors, actors, and the entire crew for a film to be finally presented on the silver screen. During this time, they often have to make some decisions that can dramatically alter the outcome of the project, all in pursuit of achieving an excellent result and turning the film into a lucrative hit. Many times, this also means making significant changes in the plot or even changing certain aspects of the characters, from supporting roles to main characters. That is what happened, for instance, in the Back to the Future franchise, which came close to starring actor Eric Stoltz, who was almost two months working as part of the cast until, eventually, director Robert Zemeckis fired the actor and hired Michael J. Fox in order to take Marty McFly's character in a whole new direction.

One other aspect in which filmmakers must be critical is in defining the amount of footage to be included in the final version of the film: which shots and scenes are kept and which ones are discarded. Of course, when cutting, they leave out storylines and characters, along with the actors who play them. Frequently, these actors who do not make it into the finished version of the film tend to portray minor characters, or may even be at an early stage in their careers. However, surprisingly, this has also happened to some of the greatest actors of the movie industry. Therefore, this article will go over a few major actors' roles that were cut from hit movies.

The 2015 film Black Mass recounts the true story of Whitey Bulger (Johnny Depp), the most vicious and infamous criminal in Boston's history and one of the FBI's most wanted criminals. For this project, Sienna Miller was set to play Catherine Greig, Bulger's girlfriend. The actress got to shoot her scenes with Depp and even worked hard to mimic the character's required accent, but she ended up being cut from the movie. According to the film's director, Scott Copper, per Vanity Fair, the reasons behind this decision had to do with narrative choices, since the time period of Bulger's life in which he was involved with Greig was not so intense, and therefore he decided not to include it in the film.

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By the time Life of Pi was released in 2012, Tobey Maguire had been famous for more than a decade, most notably for his role in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy. For that particular reason, director Ang Lee decided not to use his character's scenes in the film. Maguire had a small role as the writer Yann Martel in Life of Pi, but due to Tobey's popularity, the director was worried that he would have drawn too much attention to his minor role, so he ended up replacing him with Rafe Spall, who re-shot the scenes.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie star in Mr. & Mrs. Smith as John and Jane, a seemingly normal married couple who are both secretly expert assassins working for rival companies. Angela Bassett was hired to play John's boss in this project, but her scenes never made it into the film. Nevertheless, the actress' voice is heard in the final version, as she briefs John on his upcoming mission.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is a 2019 comedy-drama film directed by Quentin Tarantino and starring Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Margot Robbie. The director originally cast Tim Roth as part of the project to play the butler of Jay Sebring, Hollywood stylist and close friend of Sharon Tate. However, because the film proved to run too long, Tarantino was forced to prioritize certain storylines, which is why he decided to cut out, among other things, Roth's character's backstory altogether.

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When Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind premiered in 2005, Ellen Pompeo had not yet landed her most famous role as Meredith Grey in Grey's Anatomy, so being hired to appear in this Michel Gondry film boosted her confidence. She was cast to play Naomi, Jim Carrey's character Joel Barish's ex-girlfriend. Ultimately, however, the director felt that Pompeo's character would take attention away from the film's central connection, that of Kate Winslet and Carrey, so he decided to cut her scenes altogether.

In the 2011 film Bridesmaids, Kristen Wiig's character ended up falling in love with Rhodes, a cop played by Chris O'Dowd. Yet, Paul Feig's initial idea, as the director of this comedy, was for Annie (Wiig) to explore a few other love interests before achieving her happy ending. In order to do that, Paul Rudd was hired, and his character was meant to take Annie on a date at a skating rink. That scene, however, was eventually cut as they had too much footage for the film and didn't feel like introducing a second love interest for Annie. In subsequent interviews, via Looper, Wiig, who also officiated as screenwriter, commented on how difficult it was to cut the scene, as they really liked it and also had fun filming it.

Originally, right after Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) snapped his fingers in Avengers: Endgame, directors Anthony and Joe Russo included a scene in which Stark went to the metaphysical way station with a grown-up version of his daughter Morgan, and they both had a talk in which she forgave him and brought him peace before his death. The adult version of Morgan was played by Katherine Langford. Still, the filmmakers felt the scene might be too confusing for an already complex film and that, combined with the fact that the scene didn't resonate with them on an emotional level at all, ended up scrapping the scene from the film altogether.

​​​Steven Spielberg's film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial has become a film classic that still attracts worldwide fans to this day. One little known fact about this 1982 film is that Harrison Ford was cast in it, but his scenes were not included in the final version. In E.T., Ford played the Principal of Elliot's (Henry Thomas) school, and one of their shared scenes featured him scolding the boy for freeing some frogs that were to be dissected. Ultimately, as was the case in Life of Pi, Spielberg decided not to feature Ford in the film, afraid that his participation would prove to be a distraction that would take the audience's attention away from the main focus of the film.