Daniel Cudmore Confirms He Was Offered Colossus In Deadpool

For those that didn’t follow the filming of Deadpool, it must’ve been a surprise when they saw Colossus (aka Piotr Nikolaievitch Rasputin) in the trailer and he wasn’t being played by Daniel Cudmore, who had played the metal-skinned mutant in X2: X-Men United, X-Men: The Last Stand, and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

“I did actually call Daniel Cudmore to ask him if he wanted to do this, even though he’d be entirely CG the whole time,” director Tim Miller told Empire. “He was very nice about it. He was like, ‘I appreciate your offering, but nah.’”

After Cudmore passed, the role eventually went to 6′ 10½” actor Andre Tricoteux, who is best known for his roles in ABC’s Once Upon A Time and the fantasy-adventure film Seventh Son.

Cudmore responded to Miller’s comments by revealing that he didn’t just turn down the role because Colossus would be entirely computer-generated throughout — they wanted to use someone else’s voice too.

Tim Miller also told Empire, “We were never going to be able to keep Colossus as a secret. He was in the script that leaked and all that. I wasn’t actually sure, until we were standing there shooting it, that at some point Fox was going to say, ‘Hold on a second; we can’t put Colossus from our treasured X-Men franchise in this movie to be made fun of!’ But they did, and not only that, but also they let me change the look of him. As a fanboy I’ve always been like, ‘That dude with the shiny skin is not ****ing Colossus.’ He should be this monstrous guy, and they actually let me make him seven-and-a-half feet tall.”

Based upon Marvel Comics’ most unconventional anti-hero, DEADPOOL tells the origin story of former Special Forces operative turned mercenary Wade Wilson, who after being subjected to a rogue experiment that leaves him with accelerated healing powers, adopts the alter ego Deadpool. Armed with his new abilities and a dark, twisted sense of humor, Deadpool hunts down the man who nearly destroyed his life.

Deadpool hits theaters on Feb. 12, 2016. You can check out every other upcoming Marvel movie on ComicBook.com’s Comic Book Movie Release Schedule!