Brendan Fraser has revealed he lost out on playing Superman because it was obvious in his screen test that he was unsure if he wanted the part.

The Mummy actor auditioned to play Clark Kent/Superman in Superman: Flyby, which was written by J.J. Abrams, in the early 2000s, but he didn’t get the role and the movie never got made.

During a recent interview on The Howard Stern Show, Fraser admitted it would have been “a life-changing amazing opportunity” but he wasn’t sure if it would be good for his career.

“Say you do get the job to be the Man of Steel, it’s gonna be chipped on your gravestone, are you okay with that? I mean, you’ll forever more known as the Man of Steel,” he explained. “There was a sort of Faustian bargain that went into (it). I think inherently, I didn’t want to be known for only one thing because I prided myself on diversity my whole professional life and I’m not a one-trick pony.”

While Fraser partly blamed “shenanigans and studio politics” on the part and the project not coming to fruition, he acknowledged that his hesitance was probably apparent in the screen test.

“I think that’s why you test… they could kind of see I was only there like 98 per cent,” the 54-year-old added.

Elsewhere, the Oscar nominee revealed that he was one of six or seven contenders for the part. When Stern asked him to name some of his competitors, Fraser named late Fast and Furious star Paul Walker, who did his screen test before him.

After Superman: Flyby was shelved, the Man of Steel didn’t return to screens until 2006’s Superman Returns, which starred Brandon Routh.

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