George Clooney slipped into the role of the famous Dark Knight for Batman & Robin in 1997. He regretted the decision years later and apologized to the fans.
Over the years, many actors have donned the dark bat cape of comic book avenger Batman. Christian Bale’s role in Christopher Nolan’s iconic Dark Knight trilogy has become indispensable, while Michael Keaton was in front of the camera for Tim Burton’s adaptation at the end of the 1980s and we have seen Ben Affleck and Robert Pattinson in the role in more recent film adaptations.
However, George Clooney also slipped into the role of the Dark Knight in 1997 under the direction of Joel Schumacher (Flatliners) and was seen alongside Uma Thurman and Arnold Schwarzenegger in Batman & Robin – a decision that Clooney is still extremely unhappy about today. The Ocean’s 11 star revealed on the Graham Norton Show that for years he believed he had destroyed the franchise once and for all with his performance
George Clooney apologized to the fans for Batman & Robin
As George Clooney explained in an interview, he had to interrupt his honeymoon in 2014 for an appearance at ComicCon to promote his film Tomorrowland. There, he promptly took the opportunity to apologize to fans for Batman & Robin – which also has an underground score of 12 percent positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes:
I always apologize for Batman & Robin. […] Let me put it this way, I really thought I had destroyed the franchise until someone else brought it back years later in a completely different way. I thought it was a really good career decision at the time. Well, it wasn’t.
(Alicia Silverstone George Clooney and Chris O’Donnell in Batman & Robin)
In fact, a full 26 years after his Batman performance, George Clooney returned to the big screen as the Dark Knight and made a guest appearance in the DC flop The Flash in 2023. However, this was a one-off for Clooney – he revealed last December that there were “not enough drugs in the world” to get him to return as Batman on a larger scale.
