Schwarzenegger recounts his experience with Simpson in an “Empire” magazine profile, telling about how the producer showed him the script while “wiped out” and “totally stoned.” This was clearly not a final draft based on what Schwarzenegger had to say about it, and Simpson seemed hesitant to even let him read the full screenplay, probably because it wasn’t yet complete:
“He has 85 pages with him and there are handwritten notes all over it by Jerry Bruckheimer. He says, ‘Here, look at this script. But don’t read it! Just, here’s what the premise is…’ He was all over the place. I said, ‘Look, Don. I can’t make a commitment based on what you’re showing me here. You won’t even let me read the script! Why don’t you bake it some more, develop it some more and then we’ll talk again.’ He was very upset. He just walked out and then went to Nicolas Cage with the part.”
The curious part about this plan is that, for all of the macho attitude that Bay imbues “The Rock” with, Cage’s role as nerdy FBI scientist Dr. Stanley Goodspeed contrasts with the rest of the film’s gristle for both comedic and suspenseful effect. This is especially true of the relationship with his screen partner Sean Connery, who plays maximum security inmate and master-of-escape John Mason. Schwarzenegger is arguably too much of an action star to convincingly pull that off (case in point: his role as a “regular dad” in “Jingle All the Way”), so the switch to Cage was probably the right move, even if Cage himself thought the character wasn’t macho enough. Ironically, there’s a case to be made that Nic Cage’s next roles as bona fide action heroes would have been better for Arnold, but that’s a debate for another time.
