Christopher Nolan considered casting Heath Ledger as Batman

Christopher Nolan may be done telling Baman stories on the big screen , but apparently he has plenty more stories to tell about making the films themselves.

While talking at a Lincoln Centre Q&A in New York City this week (via Hitfix ), the director revealed that he originally considered casting Heath Ledger as The Bat in Batman Begins .

When Nolan met with Ledger, though, the actor politely declined - and told him he’d never be in a comic-book movie.

Fast forward a few years and Ledger was so impressed with what Nolan did with 2005’s Batman Begins that he agreed to meet to talk about The Dark Knight .

“He didn’t like to work too much,” Nolan explains of the actor. “He liked to do a character and then stop working and let enough time go by until he was hungry for it again.

“And that’s what happened when he came in; he was really ready to do something like that.”

Though we obviously can't imagine anybody else playing The Joker or Batman in Nolan's film, we're sure Ledger would have made a fantastic Bat. If only we had a screen test to pore over...

Josh Winning has worn a lot of hats over the years. Contributing Editor at Total Film, writer for SFX, and senior film writer at the Radio Times. Josh has also penned a novel about mysteries and monsters, is the co-host of a movie podcast, and has a library of pretty phenomenal stories from visiting some of the biggest TV and film sets in the world. He would also like you to know that he "lives for cat videos..." Don't we all, Josh. Don't we all.