Ryan Gosling gained weight to play the grieving father in The Lovely Bones, then left the film before shooting began. Mark Wahlberg took over as Jack Salmon after Gosling and director Peter Jackson disagreed about the character.
Gosling described his preparation at The Hollywood Reporter’s November 5, 2010 actors’ roundtable: “I was melting Haagen Dazs and drinking it when I was thirsty,” he said. In his account, his weight went from 150 to 210 pounds.
The numbers differ across accounts. Variety’s October 21, 2007 report put his gain at 20 pounds and noted that he’d grown a beard.
It cited creative differences: Gosling left on October 19, Wahlberg committed that Sunday, and filming began in Pennsylvania the next day. The 60-pound figure and ice cream detail came from Gosling’s own recollection 3 years later.
Producer Fran Walsh offered another explanation to The Hollywood Reporter in December 2009. She said Gosling had repeatedly told them, “I’m not the right person for this role, I’m too young”. Her account placed the realization a month before filming, a different timeline from Variety’s contemporaneous report.
Asked about the recasting in May 2026, Jackson didn’t confirm the specifics. He called Gosling “a fantastic actor” and said that when a role needs recasting, “we got it wrong… it’s actually our fault”.
The film, adapted from Alice Sebold’s 2002 novel, reached theaters in 2009, with Saoirse Ronan as Susie Salmon and Wahlberg as her father.