Nicolas Cage has shared some insights into his career, revealing that several renowned directors, including Christopher Nolan, Woody Allen, and Paul Thomas Anderson, stopped offering him roles after he declined their projects. However, Cage highlighted that David O Russell was the only director to reach out to him again following a rejection.
“David O Russell offered me a movie a million years ago,” Cage said on the New York Times podcast The Interview. “It was a good movie, and he offered it and I said no, and he’s the only director that I ever said no to who actually came back and offered me another movie.”
Cage is set to star in Russell’s upcoming film Madden, where he will portray the late football coach and broadcaster John Madden. The drama chronicles Madden’s career with the Oakland Raiders, his success as a broadcaster, and his role in creating the Madden NFL video game franchise. The film also features Christian Bale as Raiders owner Al Davis, John Mulaney as Electronic Arts founder Trip Hawkins, Kathryn Hahn as Virginia Madden, and Sienna Miller as Carol Davis.
“Most of them, they get their feelings hurt and don’t call you back. It’s happened a million times to me,” Cage said. “It’s happened with Christopher Nolan, it’s happened with Woody Allen, it’s happened with Paul Thomas Anderson. They don’t call me back.”
Cage mentioned that Nolan had offered him a role in the 2002 psychological thriller Insomnia, though he did not specify which character he was considered for. The film, a remake of Erik Skjoldbjærg’s 1997 Norwegian thriller of the same name, stars Al Pacino as homicide detective Will Dormer and Martin Donovan as his partner Hap Eckhart, who are tasked with investigating the murder of a 17-year-old girl in the Alaskan town of Nightmute. Robin Williams co-stars as Walter Finch, a crime novelist who becomes entangled in a psychological cat-and-mouse game with Dormer after Eckhart is accidentally shot during the investigation.
As for Paul Thomas Anderson, Cage only described it as “a very early movie.” He explained, “He’d shown me a short film with Philip Baker Hall, and we were going to do something and it didn’t work out.”
Cage emphasized that his decision to take on Madden was heavily influenced by Russell’s willingness to reach out again. “David did call me, and it showed a lot of class that he would call me back and invite me again,” Cage said. “And I didn’t want to say no to him again because I have great respect for his talent. And it was a beautiful experience. I enjoyed working with David. I enjoyed working with Christian, John Mulaney. But it was a big challenge.”
In addition to Madden, Cage is set to star in Spider-Noir, Prime Video’s live-action adaptation of Marvel’s Spider-Man Noir comics. The series will see Cage play an ageing private investigator and superhero in 1930s New York, reprising the version of the Spider-Man Noir character he voices in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Spider-Noir also stars Lamorne Morris, Brendan Gleeson, and Abraham Popoola, and is expected to premiere in 2026.
Madden is scheduled to be released on Prime Video on 26 November 2026.
