Movie News

Iron Man star feared he would be turned Down -ey over drug past

Thu 28 Feb 12:20 PM

Former hellraiser Robert Downey Jnr thought he had no chance of playing comic book favourite Iron Man because of his drug past.

The actor, who has had a very public battle with drug addiction, plays the super hero in the new film this year. And Downey Jnr admits it was a surprise that he was asked to play a lead in an adventure film aimed at a family audience.

He told Empire magazine, "I’d never had an opportunity to do something like this that I thought could be so good and with the right people.

“I felt like I might not get a shot at doing it because of the wreckage of my past, even though it had been long enough, in my eyes.”

Terrence Howard, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeff Bridges and Samuel L Jackson also flesh out the impressive cast of the comic book movie, which revolves around the tale of an arms dealer who learns the error of his ways and decides to fight crime as Iron Man.