in a new profile, joked that he—and many other actors—owe their careers to Leonardo DiCaprio, who seemingly always gets first dibs. “It’s not just me,” Bale told the magazine.
Theadded that it generally doesn’t matter how “friendly” an actor is with a filmmaker: “They all offered every one of those roles to him first… So, thank you, Leo, because literally, he gets to choose everything he does.” Bale clarified that he didn’t take this personally, but “I would suspect that almost everybody of similar age to him in Hollywood owes their careers to him passing on whatever project it is.
I would suspect DiCaprio career benefited greatly from River Phoenix dying. I’ve never seen a direct connection made, but I strongly suspect Phoenix would have been given first dibs on roles DiCaprio got..