freaky friday

Elizabeth Banks Could Do The Martian, But Could Matt Damon Do Cocaine Bear?

Elizabeth Banks (left) wanted to turn her poop into vegetables, like Matt Damon (right) did in The Martian. Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos by John Fleenor via Getty Images and 20th Century Studios/YouTube

As Lady Gaga basically once said, “One second I’m the martian, then suddenly the martian is me.” In a recent New York Times Magazine interview, Cocaine Bear director Elizabeth Banks said that she would aspire to play roles that had “qualities that we look at in men and boys and think, This is the recipe to create a winner in life.” “I watched The Martian, and I was like, I could have crushed this role,” Banks specified. “Matt Damon, love him. He’s having to figure out how to survive. I want that role.” The 2015 Ridley Scott film follows an astronaut, played by Damon, as he attempts to survive being stranded on Mars. The role caught Damon a nomination for Best Actor at the Academy Awards, the chance to work with the Alien auteur, and, most importantly, the opportunity to compost his own excrement onscreen. Sure, Banks could grow life on Mars, but could Damon get Universal to name a movie Cocaine Bear? (“I was like, ‘I don’t want to direct this if you’re going to tell me it’s going to be called Bear in the Woods,’” Banks added.) Could he pull off Effie Trinket’s butterfly headpiece in The Hunger Games? Intensely tongue Paul Rudd in Wet Hot American Summer? What about playing the romantic interest of a 30 Rock character? Okay, fine, they both did that … But Mr. We Bought a Zoo definitely would’ve settled for Bear in the Woods.

Elizabeth Banks Thinks She Would Have Crushed The Martian