According to The Hollywood Reporter, Christian Bale isn’t going to play the late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, after all. A little more than a week after Aaron Sorkin declared to Bloomberg that Bale’s involvement in Jobs was all but certain, negotiations appear to have fallen through. Sources say that Bale ultimately decided he wasn’t the right actor for the Danny Boyle-directed film.
Filmmakers must now regroup and find an actor who can distill the essence of Jobs in what Sorkin describes as “an extremely difficult part”—possibly a reference to the humiliating experience of shooting an entire film in black mock-turtlenecks and mom jeans.
Producers recently had been eyeing Seth Rogen to play Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak; it’s unclear if Bale’s departure will affect Rogen’s participation.
In any case, Ashton Kutcher can rest easy for now, knowing that he still lays claim to the third most definitive depiction of the zeitgeist-creating Steve Jobs, right behind Justin Long and Noah Wyle.