Michael Douglas has claimed Debra Winger was lined-up to play Kathleen Turner’s role in Romancing The Stone – but she lost the role after biting him.
The actor, who played mercenary Jack Colton in the 1984 action-adventure rom-com, explained on podcast Literally! With Rob Lowe how he met Winger while she was in production for Terms Of Endearment.
“[Winger] comes with us to have dinner one night, we’re talking and we’re knocking back tequilas,” Douglas said.
“We walk out and, just as you would kind of go ‘Oh you!’ and give someone a punch in the arm, she goes ‘Oh you!’ and she reaches over and she bites me – on my arm. I’m like, ‘Aaargh!’ She bites me.
“She’s joking and I’m looking at her thinking, ‘I don’t know man, this could be rough… she’s broken the skin!’”
When Douglas went back for a meeting with the studio and director Robert Zemeckis about Winger, the actor said he couldn’t do the role opposite her due to the biting incident.
“I break down in tears and say, ‘I can’t go to the jungle with her – she bit me on the arm! I can’t do it – it’s not worth it!’ So they said, ‘OK, all right.’”
Alongside Douglas and Turner, Romancing The Stone starred Danny DeVito, Zack Norman, Alfonsu Arau and Manuel Ojeda.
Douglas is set to reprise his role of Hank Pym in Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania, alongside Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly and Michelle Pfeiffer. The film is scheduled to be released on July 28, 2023.
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