Russell Crowe stood up for Brad Pitt last year, and ended up saving Brad from getting sued and having his professional reputation tarnished. It all started while State of Play was in pre-production. Brad Pitt and Edward Norton were signed on to play the two leads – reuniting them at long last since Fight Club. Unfortunately, the script still needed work (in Brad’s opinion) when the writers’ strike happened.

Instead of going ahead with a film and a script he didn’t like, Brad pulled out, as did Edward Norton. The director and the producers scrambled, and quickly cast Russell Crowe and Ben Affleck. When Russell signed on, he made the producers promise that they would not seek a multi-million dollar lawsuit against Brad for breech of contract. According to sources, Crowe was adamant about this. What’s weird is that Russell and Brad aren’t even friends, and they’ve barely met in passing a few times. The Daily Mail has more:

Russell Crowe saved fellow star actor Brad Pitt from a multi-million dollar legal bloodbath after Angelina’s other half quit the movie State Of Play.

Crowe, not known publicly for such kindnesses, insisted that Pitt not be hit with a lawsuit.

Actors had been hired, sets had been built – but Pitt wasn’t happy with the script for State Of Play. It couldn’t be re-written because Hollywood’s screen writers were then on strike, so the actor fled.

Universal – the studio bankrolling the picture – was outraged, and in no mood to put up with an actor throwing his toys out of the pram because he took exception to a word or two in a script. Universal’s legal people let it be known they were considering suing Pitt.
Meanwhile, desperate to rescue his movie, the film’s director Kevin Macdonald flew to Australia to meet Russell Crowe.

The Oscar-winning actor told Macdonald he’d be happy to be in the movie but was emphatic about one thing: he told the film-maker and other executives that before any negotiations began he wanted an agreement that Universal and Working Title, the London-based powerhouse company producing the film, would not take any legal action against Pitt.

‘Russell’s view was that the film was going ahead anyway and to pursue Brad would have been punitive as he was always going to suffer the professional embarrassment over the way he left,’ a source close to the actor told me.

There seems to have been no particular reason why Crowe should have shown his benevolent side to Pitt. The two actors barely know each other and, what’s more, Pitt was never told about Crowe’s magnanimous gesture.

Even some at the studio weren’t aware of it. ‘He’s such a t****r,’ said one executive. ‘But sometimes he gets it, and can surprise you.’

As we now know, the movie turned out well, and has become the year’s most acclaimed thriller, with Crowe on good form and Helen Mirren clearly enjoying herself as his editor (and sneaking in a few choice British swear words).

As Helen told me (and I apologise for repeating it here, but it is quite funny): ‘Americans think twat is some form of endearment, so I got away with using that and a few others.’

From The Daily Mail

“Pitt was never told about Crowe’s magnanimous gesture.” Well, he is now. I wonder why this information was released now? Now, after State of Play didn’t do that well at the box office? Could it be that Crowe just mentioned it to someone, and they repeated the story? Is it some kind of public relations strategy to make Russell look like a nice guy? In any case, it was a very magnanimous move on Russell’s part. He probably thought of it as just a professional courtesy amongst actors – one that he hopes comes back to him in some way.

Brad Pitt is shown on 3/5/09. Russell Crowe and Helen Mirren are shown at the UK State of Play premiere on 4/21/09. Credit: WENN.com