Avatar director James Cameron has shut down Matt Damon’s claims that he allegedly turned down a major payday to appear in the franchise.
“He was never offered the part. I can’t remember if I sent him the script or not. I don’t think I did,” Cameron, 71, told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview published on Thursday, December 18. “We wound up on a call and he said, ‘I love to explore doing a movie with you. I have a lot of respect for you as a filmmaker. [Avatar] sounds intriguing, but I really have to do this Jason Bourne movie. I’ve agreed to it, it’s a direct conflict, and so, regretfully, I have to turn it down.’”
Cameron, however, stressed that Damon, 55, was “never offered” a part in Avatar to begin with.
“There was never a deal. We never talked about the character. We never got to that level,” he said. “It was simply an availability issue. What he’s done is he’s extrapolated ‘I get 10 percent of the gross on all my films.’ And if, in his mind, that’s what it would’ve taken for him to do Avatar, then it wouldn’t have happened. Trust me on that.”
Damon has repeatedly claimed that he was the one to walk away from a part in the Avatar franchise.
“I was offered a little movie called Avatar, James Cameron offered me 10 percent of it,” Damon once said during the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, per Deadline. “I will go down in history … you will never meet an actor who turned down more money.”
While disputing Damon’s version of events, Cameron made it clear that there’s no bad blood.
“Matt, it’s OK, buddy! You didn’t miss anything,” Cameron joked to THR. “He felt compelled to call me personally and tell me [he wasn’t able to make the movie]. He said he didn’t want it to come from the agent; that’s an honorable guy. So, all respect to Matt.”
He continued, “I’d love to work with him someday, but [Damon’s claims] never happened. It was a conflation of different things that were happening.”
Avatar was released in 2009, following paralyzed former Marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) who is suddenly healed by a Na’vi woman (Zoe Saldaña). As the pair’s bond deepens, Jake must try to survive in her world of Pandora. Avatar has since spawned two sequels, The Way of Water and Fire and Ash, with even more in development.
“Sam’s character is challenged in ways he hasn’t been before, and I think Sam as an actor has grown,” Cameron teased to THR of Jake’s journey in Fire and Ash. “Not that he was ever not raw and real and authentic, but I think he’s grown in the wisdom of his choices.”
Worthington, 49, has felt the same about working with the Titanic filmmaker.
“It’s never been something I’ve actually really worried about,” he told Rolling Stone UK, referring to the movies’ production delays. “I get to work with, arguably, the most visionary director there is — the more time I get to spend with that guy, the better.”
