John Cusack has finally addressed a long-running Breaking Bad rumor about Walter White. Vince Gilligan created the iconic neo-Western crime drama.
In a conversation with Josh Horowitz on the Happy, Sad, Confused podcast, John Cusack settled a decades-old rumor that he had turned down playing Walter White. The character was eventually played by the acclaimed actor Bryan Cranston.
“I never ever remembered that, and I was like, did that happen, and I blacked it out? Did I lose time?” he said. For his own clarity, Cusack even reached out to the creator, Gilligan, himself. “I met Vince Gilligan in New York, and I was like, ‘Hey, man, I love your show, it’s awesome. I gotta know, everyone is saying you offered me that — did you offer me that?’”
Cusack said, “He was like, ‘No.’ I was like, ‘Thank you, Vince!’”
Cusack says he can’t imagine anyone but Bryan Cranston as Walter White
In the same conversation, John Cusack also expressed his honest opinion on Bryan Cranston’s portrayal of Walter White in Breaking Bad.
“People say, ‘Oh, would you regret doing that?’” he explained. “I was like, ‘How could you regret Bryan Cranston playing that role? It was meant to be his.’”
Walter White, the protagonist of Breaking Bad, is a high school chemistry teacher who learns he has lung cancer. To make sure his family remains financially stable, White teams up with a former student, Jesse Pinkman, played by Aaron Paul, and starts producing and selling drugs.
For his performance as Walter White, Cranston won four Emmy Awards. Across the five seasons, Breaking Bad won 16 Emmys out of 58 total nominations. Breaking Bad also received further recognition when The New York Times named it the best show of the 21st century.
The series has remained a huge hit among critics and fans alike. Currently, it holds a near-perfect Tomatometer score of 96% and Popcornmeter score of 97% on Rotten Tomatoes.
