Kurt Russell has a pretty solid career — there aren’t many movies of his I’d consider to be awful. Not all of them are great, of course, but he clearly is an actor with a good sense of taste. He knows what works for him, and how to perform. And as it turns out, quality was a reason he initially turned down “Stargate.” In fact, according to Dean Devlin (via Variety), Russell turned down the film “several times.”

This was a problem, as the production really wanted someone with Russell’s starpower in the lead. Eventually, the reason behind Russell’s reluctance was revealed: he had the wrong script. As Devlin put it, “[W]hat we found out is that he had been given the wrong script … He was given a very early draft of the script that should never have gotten out. So, when he actually saw the shooting script he went, ‘Oh, this isn’t so bad.'”

“Oh, this isn’t so bad” isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement of a script, but apparently “not so bad” was good enough to finally convince Russell to take the role.