Friends Star David Schwimmer on Turning Down Men in Black: A ‘Brutal Decision’

Though David Schwimmer’s career has taken on different heights since he starred as Ross Geller in the hit sitcom Friends, he still thinks his career would have looked differently if he had accepted an offer to star in the 1997 film Men in Black. 

Apart from Friends, Schwimmer boasts stellar acting credits, including The Wonder Years, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Big Nothing, Nothing But Truth, Come Fly With Me, The Iceman, and The People Vs. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story, among others. 

While Schwimmer expressed no regrets about turning down the Men in Black project (which ended up starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones instead), it was still a “brutal decision,” according to the actor. 

Why did David Schwimmer turn down Men in Black?

During Sony Music Entertainment’s Origins with Cush Jumbo podcast (via IndieWire), the actor revealed that he chose to direct his first-ever movie (the 1998 romance drama Since You’ve Been Gone) instead of starring in Men in Black. 

“[It] was a brutal decision. I had just finished filming ‘The Pallbearer,’ my first film with Gwyneth Paltrow, and there were high expectations of that which didn’t come true. It was kind of a bomb but there were high expectations and the studio which was Miramax wanted to lock me into a three-picture deal at a fixed price and I said I would do that if I got to direct my first movie,” the actor explained. 

He added, “So after months of negotiations, they finally said that I would act in three more movies for them but I got to direct my entire theatre company in the first film. All these unknown actors but I was going to put them on the map, basically. I was going to let everyone discover the talent of this amazing company.”

He also stated that it wasn’t because of his Friends production schedule that he opted to turn it down, but his directorial project that overlapped with the Men in Black schedule. 

Schwimmer continued, “We found this amazing script and we were developing it. We started pre-production. All my best friends in the world in my theatre company quit their jobs so they could be in this film over the summer, which was going to be a six-week shoot in Chicago. We’re in pre-production, hired the whole crew, everything’s going and that’s when I was offered ‘Men in Black.’ It was a direct conflict with this. My summer window from ‘Friends’ was four months. I had a four-month hiatus and ‘Men in Black’ was going to shoot exactly when I was going to direct this film with my company. And of course, it was an amazing opportunity . . . However, my theatre company and that relationship with all those people would probably have ended.”

The actor also acknowledges that his career would have taken a different direction had he starred in the 1997 action sci-fi. 

“Look, I’m really aware, whatever 20 years later maybe more, [‘Men in Black’] would have made me a movie star. If you look at the success of that film and that franchise, my career would have taken a very different trajectory,” he said.