O.J. Simpson Was Originally Up For ‘The Terminator’, But Lost The Role Because “He Was Not Believable As A Killing Machine”

Before he was acquitted on murder charges, O.J. Simpson came close to helming James Cameron‘s iconic Terminator franchise in the famed role that ultimately went to Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In a 2019 interview with The Independent, Schwarzenegger claimed that “it was actually O.J. Simpson that was the first-cast Terminator.” He added, “Somehow [James Cameron] felt that he was not as believable for a killing machine. So then they hired me. That’s really what happened.”

However, Cameron debunked the rumors that Simpson was cast in the film, telling the Los Angeles Times in 2019 that it was merely an idea Orion Pictures co-founder Mike Edavoy suggested — an idea Cameron described as “the stupidest thing we’d ever heard in our lives.”

“O.J. Simpson was never in the mix at all,” he said. “That was rejected out of hand before it ever got any traction.”

He later explained exactly how the conversation happened in a 2023 episode of Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace? on Max.

“Very early on, a highly placed person at one of the two studios that funded that film had a brilliant idea and called me up and said, ‘Are you sitting down?’ I said, ‘Well, no, I’m not.’ He said, ‘Are you sitting? O.J. Simpson for the Terminator!’ I said, ‘I actually think that’s a bad idea,'” Cameron recalled, per Variety. “It didn’t go anywhere.”

Cameron also denied Schwarzenegger’s claim that he was gifted a painting of the Terminator that originally featured Simpson. The actor told The Independent that if you scratched off his face, you would find Simpson’s underneath.

“Let me correct that right now,” Cameron said, per the LA Times. “Arnold is literally just wrong. I know it’s hard to imagine! You don’t argue with Arnold.”

He added, “I didn’t make the painting for him. I made the painting for us, for the production, of him as the Terminator. There’s no O.J. under that painting.”

The Terminator came out in 1984 — exactly 10 years before Simpson was charged (and later acquitted) for the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend. The former NFL star died on Wednesday (April 10) at the age of 76 after a battle with prostate cancer.