In celebration of Festivus, Grammy-nominated singer Courtney Love is airing her grievances with actor Brad Pitt. Love is claiming she didn’t lose the role of Marla Singer in 1999’s “Fight Club” to Helena Bonham Carter, but rather she was fired from the David Fincher film due to rejecting a pitch Pitt made to play her late husband, Kurt Cobain.
The story came up while Love was a guest on the “WTF with Marc Maron” podcast.
When Pitt first pitched her with the idea of him portraying the Nirvana frontman, she “went nuclear.” She admits she later regretted the decision not to embrace “the shark instinct,” wishing she has played along until “Fight Club” was finished filming. Then, she could then have rejected Pitt while keeping iconic role. Keep in mind, Cobain tragically ended his life in 1994, meaning this all took place probably less than 5 years after his passing. Emotions were still raw, to say the least. It’s worth noting she was dating Pitt’s “Fight Club” co-star Edward Norton at the time. She says Norton told her he didn’t “have the power” to get her re-hired. Love also admits she has still never seen the film.
Apparently, Pitt has been pursuing a Cobain-based project ever since 1996. He apparently approached Love through his company Plan B as recently as 2020. “I did a Zoom with him and I stuck up for myself. I said, ‘Listen, man. I don’t know that I trust you, and I don’t know that your movies are for profit,’” she explained. “‘They’re really good social justice movies, but…if you don’t get me, you kind of don’t get Kurt, and I don’t feel like you do, Brad.’”
Love is not opposed to a biopic about her late husband. She just needs the right people involved. Folks like Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy at Warner Bros.Pictures, “Because they know how to make a f***ing movie,” she says.
Love has also commented on the podcast episode on her Instagram.
While Pitt isn’t commenting, a source close to the production of “Fight Club” contends “nearly twenty-five years ago, Courtney Love auditioned for a role in Fight Club, a role she was never offered at any point. You cannot be fired for a job you didn’t get. It’s common knowledge that roles are not decided by other actors but by the director.”
Check out the “Fight Club” trailer below:
