Christian Bale Refuses to Get Fat Fast for Enzo Ferrari Biopic

Oscar winner and former Batman actor Christian Bale is one of Hollywood's most notorious Method actors, known for his extreme weight fluctuations for roles. However, preparing for the Enzo Ferrari biopic directed by Michael Mann, the Big Short star grew concerned about his health before playing the famous race car maker, refusing to get fat fast for the role and choosing to quit instead.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Bale has stepped down from Enzo a few months before filming begins. Although he'd already started packing up the pounds to look more like the iconic Ferrari founder, he became concerned that there was no way he could stay healthy after putting on so much weight in such a short period of time.

Bale is no stranger to extreme weight losses, having gotten dangerously thin for projects like The Machinist and The Fighter (the latter of which made him an Academy Award winner) and putting on quite a bit of weight for American Hustle a couple of years back.

Deadline reports that director Mann is currently looking to find a replacement for Bale before production is set to begin in the spring. The idea is that shooting won't have to be delayed, and some of the "heavyweights" in Hollywood are currently being approached to play the role of the Italian entrepreneur, though nobody in particular has been named just yet.

Considering the film is from a top studio (Paramount) and that Mann is a respected director after films like The Insider, it wouldn't be surprising to hear soon that a new actor has been cast in the role.

The film is based on a book by Brock Yates called Enzo Ferrari: The Man, The Cars, The Races and its script was written by The Italian Job scribe Troy Kennedy-Martin. Besides Bale, the only member of the cast on the film's IMDb page was Noomi Rapace, in the role of Laura Dominica Garello, Ferrari's wife.