David Harbour Was Told He Was Too Fat To Play X-Men's The Blob
David Harbour may be your new Hellboy, but he was almost a very different super-powered character. The Stranger Things star revealed in a recent interview with TheWrap that he auditioned for the part of The Blob in the X-Men universe, but was shockingly told he was too fat for the part.
Harbour said he was approached by a casting director about the part after auditioning for one of the Wolverine films (he didn't reveal which role he went out for). "'Oh my god, David Harbour, you're in town! I have the perfect role for you,'" he remembers her saying. "I was like, 'great, I need to work, what do you got?' She's like 'The Blob... It's like an X-Men, he's like big, fat, and controls gravity.' And I was like, 'Okay, wow, that's flattering.' And she was like, 'no, no, it's not that you're fat, it's just that we need a big guy to wear the suit.'"
With that in mind, Harbour decided to go in and audition for the part, sealing it at the end by lifting up his shirt, squeezing his belly, and jokingly saying, "I got your blob right here." However, that joke ended up putting him further away from the part, with the director even calling him to a local hotel and telling him that they were worried about him. "He was like, 'David, look, you're wonderful, we really think you're just a great actor, we're just concerned... we're really concerned,'" Harbour said. "I was like, 'Why, what's your concern? I'm good to go. I'm available, let's do this!' And they were like, 'no, it's just, you lifted up your shirt and we saw the... we're just a little worried about your health.'"
"I was like, 'Wait a minute, dude, pause for one second,'" he continued. "'You are telling me I'm too fat to play The Blob? That's awesome, I have to get the f*** back to New York.' That's my audition— so I didn't get The Blob." Kevin Durand played The Blob in X-Men Origins: Wolverine (likely the film that Harbour auditioned for), while Giant Gustav Claude Ouimet played him in X-Men: Apocalypse.
While we lament the fact that Harbour never got to join the X-Men universe, see all of the places where you've seen him before.