The “Blade Runner” Financiers Apparently Had No Idea Who Harrison Ford Was, Even After “Star Wars” Came Out
In a conversation with GQ, Ridley Scott shared that the big guns behind Blade Runner seemingly took a little convincing when it came to casting Harrison Ford.
I don’t know about you, but I’d watch Harrison Ford in anything.
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Even if he himself sometimes has a more… candid opinion about his work.
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Regardless, Harrison has undoubtedly played some of the most iconic action and sci-fi characters in cinema over the years. But it definitely took longer than you might expect for him to solidify his status as a Hollywood legend.
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In fact, there was a time when movie execs were apprehensive about casting him in lead roles — as wild as that is today.
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Ridley Scott, who you might know as the genius behind masterpieces like Alien (1979), Thelma and Louise (1991), and the Gladiator films, just sat down with GQ for a look back on his directorial work over the years.
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And when discussing one of his most popular films — the 1982 cult classic Blade Runner — he revealed that casting his leading man wasn’t as obvious a choice as it might have appeared.
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For context, Harrison stars in Blade Runner as police enforcer Ric Deckard. Set in an alternate dystopian future, the film is an adaptation of the 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and also stars Sean Young and Rutger Hauer.
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“He had just finished flying the Millennium Falcon,” said Ridley.
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“I remember my financiers saying, ‘Who the fuck is Harrison Ford?’” he added. “I said, ‘You’re gonna find out.’”
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And as well as having led Star Wars, Ridley snatched up Harrison whilst Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark was in post-production.
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I don’t know what those Blade Runner financiers were missing. I guess they aren’t on my side of Letterboxd.
Either way, Harrison proved that he has everything it takes to be a leading man in Blade Runner, and also as Indiana Jones when Raiders came out.
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And somehow, he’s still pumping out incredible work today — having recently received his fifth Golden Globe nomination for the Apple original Shrinking.
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