The Mandalorian star Timothy Olyphant has revealed why he lost out on a key Star Trek role.
During an interview with Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Olyphant opened up about his Star Trek audition with J.J. Abrams.
It turns out, he was actually auditioning for the role of Dr Leonard McCoy aka “Bones”, the classic Star Trek doctor originally played by DeForest Kelley in Star Trek: The Original Series. Unfortunately, Abrams had already landed on Karl Urban for the role.
Olyphant instead auditioned for the iconic role of Captain James T. Kirk, the captain of the starship Enterprise that was made famous by the original star, William Shatner. Ironically, he missed out on the role due to his age.
“I believe it was one of those things where it’s like, he might have been prepared to hire me, but they wanted somebody younger,” said Olyphant. “He was having a hard time finding somebody younger, and somewhere along the line, J.J. called and said, ‘I found a guy, younger, who’s really good.’”
That younger actor turned out to be Chris Pine, who went on to star as Kirk in Star Trek, Stark Trek Into Darkness, and Star Trek Beyond. However, Olyphant certainly wasn’t bitter.
“I have since then met Chris Pine and I am a huge fan of him both on and off-screen,” he said. “I love that guy. He is a good dude.”
He even had nothing but great things to say about Abrams, despite losing the role. “Auditioning sucks,” he explained. “The fact that I remember the audition process fondly says a lot about J.J. Abrams and what a wonderful man that guy is.”
Timothy Olyphant may not have boldly gone where no man has gone before, but he has since headed to the galaxy far, far away as Mandalorian fan favorite, Cob Vanth.
