“I was damaged goods”: the 1996 role that got Josh Brolin “blacklisted for 10 years”

Josh Brolin said his role in the 1996 comedy *Flirting With Disaster* helped him get work at Miramax, but a later disagreement led to what he described as being “blacklisted for 10 years”. The account shows how a promising start after *The Goonies* was followed by a long, uneven period before his career took off again.

Brolin recalled that Miramax initially opposed casting him as Tony, a bisexual government agent, seeing him as too much of a “jock”; director David O Russell backed him after an audition. Brolin said the studio later stopped using him after he turned down a role, though he continued to land smaller parts and traded on the stock market. His lead role in the Coen brothers’ 2007 film *No Country for Old Men* marked a turning point, followed by an Oscar nomination for *Milk* in 2009.