Sarah Michelle Gellar reflects on her career, saying she doesn't regret turning down massive movie roles for Buffy the Vampire Slayer. As she makes her return to television, playing an arson expert who knows more than she lets on in the Paramount+ series Wolf Pack, it's a great moment for fans of the veteran actor. There's been renewed discussion about the fact that Gellar is an immensely talented performer who never got her deserved recognition, in terms of awards and big movies, despite the fact that she portrayed one of the most enduring television characters of all time.
As part of an interview with the Buffy star in The Guardian, it's mentioned that Gellar turned down major movie roles because of her commitments as the lead of a television series. She passed on projects like David Fincher's Fight Club, the Sam Mendes film American Beauty, and romantic comedy The Wedding Planner, and she was even considered by Martin Scorsese for Gangs of New York's Jenny Everdeane, a part that eventually went to Cameron Diaz. Still, in the quote below, she talks about why she doesn't dwell on what might have been:
“I also made a great television show. My mom was a single mother, working just above the poverty line, and I got to travel the world, to see and do things that would never have been afforded to me. I love what I do – which is work, work, work.”
Sarah Michelle Gellar’s Turned-Down Roles Are More Proof Of Her Excellence
Fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer are well aware of what Gellar is capable of when she's matched with the right script. Her best performance, in the eyes of many, happens in the Buffy season 5 episode "The Body," which sees the supernatural slayer reeling from the very sudden and all-too-human death of her mother. Gellar had earned a reputation at the time for being one of the best on-screen criers in Hollywood, being able to convey so much with as little as a lip quiver or a slight shift of tone.
She was also very funny and perfectly relatable and formidable without ever falling into the trope of simply being a blank action hero. Her versatility can also be seen in I Know What You Did Last Summer, in which Gellar makes a very compelling case that she should have been the final girl, or Cruel Intentions as the irresistibly enjoyable villain. Looking at the actor's presence in film, which is filled with quiet, scary movies and subdued romcoms, there have always been questions about why Gellar didn't make the jump to movie stardom even as she was one of the most popular performers of the late 1990s and early 2000s.
There are at least a few clear reasons why it didn't happen. One is that, back in that era, there was a much firmer separation between movie and TV actors, and there was a bias against those who worked in teen dramas that prevented those shows from getting nominated at the Emmys and raising their cultural cachet. Another is that, simply, Gellar was busy with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and those long hours of filming didn't allow a lot of room for other prestige projects. Still, the fact that she was thought of by acclaimed directors like Fincher, Mendes, and Scorsese is further evidence that her excellent work as the Chosen One did not go unnoticed. Hopefully, as she has hinted, Wolf Pack is just the next stop in a bigger comeback.
Source: The Guardian