Gary Oldman Almost Played A Very Different Role In The Dark Knight Movies
Seventeen years after the beginning of The Dark Knight franchise, Gary Oldman’s iconic role of Jim Gordon is still among his best and most remembered. As Gotham City’s police commissioner and Batman’s right-hand man, Jim Gordon’s character was portrayed by Oldman in all of the films from Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, including Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and The Dark Knight Rises. Though it is hard to imagine him in any other role now, Oldman almost played a very different character in The Dark Knight moviesdue to his history of being typecast as a villain.
With origins stemming from the comics, Jim Gordon’s story in Batman is one that has been told many times. In Batman Begins, Gordon is on duty the night Bruce Wayne’s parents are killed and comforts young Bruce, laying the foundation for their coming friendship. Even before Bruce becomes Batman, he thinks of Jim Gordon as one of Gotham’s only honest cops and identifies Gordon’s virtuous nature.
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Their relationship and mutual respect maintain throughout the following films, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, with Jim Gordon, in many ways, as much a hero as Batman himself. Oldman, however, was not always intended to play Gordon. Originally, he was cast as the chemical-wielding, bag-masked villain, Scarecrow (later played by Cillian Murphy).
Dubbed “Scary Gary” by Harrison Ford after a long history of playing bad guys, Gary Oldman spent much of his career typecast as a villain. In an interview (via BBC Radio 1), Oldman says,“I think that the villain thing really came out of the work I had done with Besson.” He is referring to director Luc Besson, with which Oldman
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