The Jack Ryan Role Sparked A (Maybe One-Sided) Feud Between Alec Baldwin And Harrison Ford

Shockingly enough, many of the biggest actors in Hollywood actually possess pretty huge egos. A lot of them, it seems, believe they are once-in-a-lifetime talents who deserve better treatment than everybody else. Sometimes, when two of these inflated actor egos collide, you end up with a horrific double-Hindenburg situation. Oh, the humanity! An actor feud has been born.

Who are the combatants in this feud? In one corner, we have the alpha of the Baldwin brood: Alec Baldwin. Baldwin is no stranger to weird controversy. The "Beetlejuice" star has been a lightning rod in the past — from his wife basically faking her entire life story, to leaving that awful voicemail for his daughter, to the fatal incident on the "Rush" set where he was holding a gun that killed somebody — so it's not surprising to see him re-enter the petty grudge arena.

In the other corner, we have Han Solo himself: Harrison Ford. Ford has a reputation for being a grumpy guy on set and famously is not a huge fan of the "Star Wars" films that made him famous, so it's easy to imagine someone getting on his nerves.

The backdrop of our battle? A fight for the right to portray CIA Agent Jack Ryan in the 1992 film, "Patriot Games," the sequel to 1990's "The Hunt for Red October." Baldwin played the role in the 1990 original, but a mere two years later, Ford had taken over the part, allegedly behind Baldwin's back. This shift in casting was an easy recipe for conflict, and according to Baldwin's 2017 memoir, "Nevertheless," the feud was on.

It wouldn't be the first or the last time that a studio recast a major role between movies. Ford himself was recently cast to replace the late William Hurt in his Marvel Cinematic Universe role as Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross. The change for "Patriot Games" made some sense, as Baldwin was famously overshadowed by his bigger, more established co-star, Sean Connery, in "The Hunt for Red October." Maybe the producers of the sequel wanted to get a bigger star at the helm of their movie to avoid this situation happening once again. But the idea that they went behind Baldwin's back to replace him is definitely messed up.

In Baldwin's memoir, he wrote about the situation between the two stars at the time. According to Baldwin, when director John McTiernan asked Ford if he knew that Baldwin was still in negotiations to return in "Patriot Games," Ford responded with a concise, "F**k him" — a phrase you can imagine Ford throwing out casually with little actual malice.

Ford's words, however, really got to Baldwin. Later in the book, Baldwin recalled running into Ford at a benefit and had a less-than-kind description of the actor:

"Ford, in person, is a little man, short, scrawny, and wiry, whose soft voice sounds as if it's coming from behind a door."

I've heard Baldwin roast people pretty hard before (his daughter in that voicemail, for example), but this description of Ford is pretty brutal. While both men are getting up there in years, I'm hoping we can eventually see the two come to blows in some sort of celebrity boxing situation. For charity, of course.