Karl Urban when he eagerly sought the role of Dr. Henry McCoy. In the case of the iconic Captain Kirk, though, several contenders were in the mix before Chris Pine ultimately got the green light.
When the announcement hit that J.J. Abrams would be bringing the franchise back, names such as Matt Damon, Chris Pratt, and Mark Wahlberg were speculated to step into the shoes of James T. Kirk. Nevertheless, one notable actor who nearly donned the famed gold uniform was Marvel’s own Sebastian Stan, the former Winter Soldier, who still appears a bit disappointed about missing the opportunity, even after all these years. On the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Stan recounted the lengths he went to in order to emulate the cherished character played by William Shatner.
“Captain Kirk for J.J. Abrams was one of the first things that I got very close to,” he admitted. “I was really close, and I had a screen test with him at Paramount Studios, and my manager arranged for me to do a separate photoshoot where I would try and imitate all of these William Shatner images just to send to [J.J.] to see how similar I looked and things. Didn’t land the part.” In addition to Pratt and Stan, another Marvel Cinematic Universe star auditioned for Kirk but ultimately secured a different role in “Star Trek” entirely.