Kubrick wanted John Wayne. Wayne didn't bother answering: the film is now ranked the No. 1 comedy of all time

In our timeline, the Duke couldn't even be bothered to say no. When Stanley Kubrick came calling in 1963 with the role of Major T.J. "King" Kong — the B-52 pilot who whoops his way down onto a Soviet target astride a nuclear warhead — Wayne simply never engaged. No meeting, no counteroffer, no polite pass. Screenwriter Terry Southern later said the star "dismissed it immediately." Sixty years on, the film he ignored keeps topping best-comedy rankings, holding a 98% on Rotten Tomatoes while Hollywood's As have spent decades lining up to call it the funniest thing ever put on celluloid.

How the part even became available

The role was never supposed to be cast at all. Kubrick's plan was for Peter Sellers to play four characters, Kong included — the studio had practically made it a condition of financing. Southern wrote Kong as an affectionate John Wayne send-up, and Sellers was expected to deliver a full Duke impression from the cockpit.

Then Sellers sprained his ankle, couldn't work in the cramped B-52 set, and fired off one of the great resignation notes in film history:

"Now hear this: there is no way, repeat, no way, I can play the Texas pilot, 'Major King Kong.' I have a complete block against that accent. Please forgive. Peter S."

So Kubrick decided to skip the impression and hire the real thing. Wayne ghosted him. Bonanza's Dan Blocker was approached next; his agent reportedly rejected the script as "too pinko," which for a 1963 nuclear satire was less an insult than a logline.

Enter the rodeo cowboy

The part landed on Slim Pickens, an actual former rodeo performer Kubrick remembered from the wreckage of a Marlon Brando western. Pickens accepted with characteristic elegance:

"Jest gimme a pair of loose-fittin' shoes, some tight p*y, and a warm place to st, an' ah'll be all right."

Legend has it nobody told Pickens the film was a comedy, so he played Kong completely straight — which is precisely why it's the funniest performance in the movie. The bomb-riding shot became one of the most parodied images in cinema, and Pickens worked steadily for the next two decades on the strength of it.

Wayne, meanwhile, never explained the snub. He didn't need to; the man built a career on knowing exactly what his brand was, and "gleefully nuking the planet in a satire" wasn't it. Still: the greatest comedy of all time was one returned phone call away from starring John Wayne, and he left it on read. Cinema's loss. Slim's eternal gain.