Paul Rudd is a certified Hollywood star, having roles in some of the biggest film and TV franchises to date, including Friends and the MCU. Nowadays, the Golden Globe nominated actor could probably get any movie or TV role he asked for, but that wasn’t always the case, and the Ghostbusters: Afterlife actor recently told the story revealed how he completely screwed up one of his first auditions in Hollywood.
Rudd recently appeared on the New Heights podcast to promote his most recent release, a “meta” remake of the 1997 cult comedy Anaconda. Amidst discussing some of Rudd’s legacy projects hitting the 2026 movie schedule, like the upcoming MCU blockbuster Avengers Doomsday, Jason Kelce wanted to know the veteran actor’s “welcome to Hollywood” moment. Turns out, Rudd’s first Hollywood reality check involves taking cue from the one and only Danny DeVito, and it did not go well for the Ant-Man actor.
I got an audition, one of my very first auditions, to play kind of like this tough dude, and I hadn’t really been on an audition before. But I heard this story that when Danny DeVito auditioned for the role of Louie De Palma in Taxi, that he went into the room with all the people and said, ‘Who wrote this?! It was garbage!’ And he threw it down and he jumped on the table. He didn’t really audition, he just was the guy. And he was hilarious, and they all laughed. And I remember hearing that, going, ‘That’s how you get a job…’
Sure, maybe that’s how you get the job if you’re an established Hollywood actor, as DeVito had already been in an Oscar-winning film, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, when auditioning for Taxi. He previously shared on The Tonight Show that at the time, he had acted in a number of TV guest spots, and the Taxi casting directors were already eyeing him for the role of Louis DePalma when he came in. He fit the role perfectly with his method audition, and clearly the producers made the right decision hiring him, as his performance as the rude, yet hilarious cab dispatcher is a main reason why Taxi is considered one of the best sitcoms of all time.
Unfortunately for Paul Rudd at the time of his own soon-to-be-botched “tough guy” audition, none of those factors applied to him. Still, as a trained actor new to Hollywood, he took a swing at the legendary Danny DeVito method, and it was a big miss:
I went to this casting director’s office, and it’s just me and this woman, this nice woman, behind her desk. And she goes, ‘Hello.’ I’m like, ‘Yeah?’ I’m so uncomfortable, I’m trying to be tough. And she said, ‘So did you get the pages?’ [I said,] ‘Uh huh.’ [She said,] ‘And you’ve been working on it?’ [I go,] ‘Yeah, yeah!’ [She said,] ‘OK, start whenever you want.’ I had a cigarette. I didn’t light it, I didn’t smoke either. But I had it as a prop… And then I threw it on the ground, and then I stubbed it out into her carpet. And when it was over, she said, ‘OK, thank you.’ And I left, and I was driving back, I thought, ‘I’m not gonna get that job.’
At least the Friendship actor had some self-awareness. I still can’t believe he didn’t even read any lines from the script. Even if he had stuck to the traditional audition format, I’m not sure he would have gotten the role. Don’t get me wrong, I find Paul Rudd to be a great actor with proven range past his bread and butter comedies, as evidenced by his supporting role in my favorite movie of all time, The Perks of Being A Wallflower. However, I have a hard time picturing the Ant-Man actor as an intimidating “tough guy,” especially with his age-defying baby face.
As expected, he did not get a call back on that role, but his agent did. Rudd said that after his disastrous audition for this unnamed movie, the casting director immediately called Rudd’s agent at the time to professionally tattle about his poor etiquette:
I had an agent, and I got back and she called me, and she just said, ‘What happened?’ And I told her, and she just said, ‘Well, I guess you’ve gotta learn.’ And that was like a ‘Welcome to Hollywood, this is not how you do it.’
A real learning lesson indeed. If only it had worked. As it turns out, Rudd tried the method acting route again for an audition a few years after Clueless launched his acting career. Apparently, the Death of a Unicorn actor auditioned for the role of Brandt in The Big Lebowski, yet another character I cannot picture Rudd playing, and he completely embarrassed himself. The strange audition, paired with his competition being Phillip Seymor Hoffman, led to another failed attempt.
Thankfully for the This is 40 actor, the whole Hollywood movie star thing ended up working out for him. I’m sure after he tried to channel the It’s Always Sunny actor, his agent might have had some doubts, but they were probably all washed away when Clueless eventually became a ‘90’s hit, although he apparently almost blew that audition too. That poor agent, it sounds like the I Love You, Man actor made her work for her commission!