Gladiator’s Russell Crowe Says Original Script Was “Rubbish”

Russell Crowe is currently promoting his new film, The Pope’s Exorcist, which has led to him fielding some questions about his Academy Award-winning performance as Maximus in Gladiator back in 2000. Recently, it was announced that a Gladiator sequel is currently in the works with Paul Mescal and Denzel Washington, and Ridley Scott is returning to direct. During a recent interview with Vanity Fair, Crowe talked about some of his most iconic roles, including an interesting story about Marvel wanting him to use his Gladiator accent in Thor: Love and Thunder. During the interview, Crowe also opened up about how the original script for Gladiator was “rubbish.” 

“Gladiator is my 20-somthing-th movie, so I was confident about my abilities as a lead man,” Crowe explained. “What I wasn’t confident about Gladiator was the world that was surrounding me. At the core of what we were doing was a great concept, but the script was rubbish. Absolute rubbish. And it has all these, sort of, strange sequences. One of them was about chariots and how famous gladiators – and this is all true, right? – to use certain types of chariots and some famous gladiators had endorsement deals with products for olive oil and like that,” Crowe explained with a laugh. 

He continued, “And that’s all true, but it’s just not gonna ring right to a modern audience. They’re gonna go, ‘What the f*ck is all this?’ The energy around what we were doing was very fractured. I did think a couple times, maybe my best option is just to get on a plane and get out of here, you know? It was my continued conversations with Ridley that sort of gave me faith.”

Is Russell Crowe in Gladiator 2? 

Despite the return of director Ridley Scott, Crowe is not involved in the Gladiator sequel. In fact, the actor recently told Collider that he’s “jealous” of the new movie’s cast. 

“I mean, look, the only thing that I really feel about it is slightly jealous, you know? Because I was a much younger man, obviously, and it was a huge experience in my life,” Crowe explained. “It’s something that changed my life, really. It changed the way people regarded me and what I do for a living, and, you know, I’ve been very lucky to be involved in lots of big movies, but the legs on that film are incredible. Here it is, it’s 2023, and we made that film in 1999. I guarantee you, somewhere around the world tonight, Gladiator is going to be showing on primetime TV. And you don’t always get that kind of longevity with every film you do, so, it obviously holds a special place in my heart.”

The Pope’s Exorcist is currently playing in theaters.