starring in “The Running Man,” a film adaptation of Stephen King’s amazing 1982 novel of the same name.
Before Powell could rise to such heights, he had to deal with countless rejections. One rejection that particularly stung came around 2016, when Disney and Lucasfilm were looking for actors to play a young Han Solo in the film “Solo: A Star Wars Story.” Competing against other prospective “Solo” stars like Ansel Elgort, Miles Teller, and Dave Franco, Powell was devastated when he dropped the ball at the last moment and the role went to Alden Ehrenreich instead.
“I can joke about it now, [but] I blew that final audition,” he told GQ UK in a 2024 profile. He added, “It’s haunting when you blow those moments.”
While everyone deals with rejection throughout their careers, rejection in Hollywood has a unique sting. A single role can change an actor’s whole life. And when you lose out on a role you really wanted, you might be reminded of the loss on billboards and magazine covers for weeks, even months on end. Powell’s method of avoiding envy has been to try to keep a Zen attitude about the whole situation. As he put it, “That was always somebody else’s ride to go on. … It was never yours to go on. If you put your time in, you’ll get your ride.”
