Inside Llewyn Davis star reveals Bourne ambition

Oscar Isaac is currently favourite among film critics courtesy of his wonderfully morose and laconic performance in the Coen brothers' latest quirky drama, Inside Llewyn Davis.

But the actor has revealed that he missed out on a role that could have sent his career in a very different direction.

[Critics hail Inside Llewyn Davis]

It turns out that Isaac was director Tony Gilroy's first choice to take over the Bourne franchise from Matt Damon and play spy Aaron Cross in The Bourne Legacy.

“Tony was very interested in me playing the role and said he would bat for me with the studio,” he told the Express.

“I did a 12-hour screen test and we talked so much about the part. But two weeks later I got a call from Tony saying: ‘It’s not going to happen because the studio just can’t take that chance on an unknown commodity.’ That was pretty hard because it felt like everything was happening.”

[Inside Llweyn Davis: Mulligan stayed as backing track]

The part, of course, went to Jeremy Renner, while Isaac played the small role of a doomed, unnamed operative 'Outcome #3'.

But Isaac isn't bitter at all about missing out on the starring role.

“If I had, I couldn’t have done Inside Llewyn Davis and this is a movie that I prepared 34 years for. So sometimes good luck comes in the form of bad luck,” he explained.

Inside Llewyn Davis hits cinemas on 24th January, 2014.