George Clooney can thank — or blame — a single episode of his hit '90s present ER for touchdown the starring position in 1997's Batman & Robin.

Director Christopher Chulack, who was behind the digicam for the medical drama's Nov. 9, 1995, episode, "Hell and Excessive Water," informed TV Insider that it was the one which secured the actor's Caped Crusader position. Clooney's character, Dr. Doug Ross, got here to the rescue of a boy who was trapped in a storm drain.

"That episode received 45 million viewers," Chulack mentioned. "The following day, this can be a true story — the following day, Bob Daley and Terry Semel, who had been the presidents of Warner Bros. Tv, got here down and knocked on George's dressing room door and informed him, 'You're going to be the following Batman due to the heroism of that episode.' So I figured it's simply going to go up from right here, and it did."

Sure, it actually did, particularly after Clooney left ER in 1999 to deal with films full-time, changing into a high-profile star in movies resembling Michael Clayton, Up within the Air, Syriana, and the Ocean's Eleven franchise.

However that most likely wasn't due to Batman & Robin.

Directed by Joel Schumacher, the superhero movie had a stacked solid that additionally included Arnold Schwarzenegger, Alicia Silverstone, Uma Thurman, and Chris O'Donnell, nevertheless it underperformed on the field workplace and was eviscerated by critics. It at present holds an 11 % score on Rotten Tomatoes primarily based on 95 critiques. Eesh!

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And Clooney is nicely conscious of the film's repute.

"I did one superhero film, and I f—ed it up so unhealthy they gained't let me close to the set," the actor joked in October 2021 at an occasion for New York Metropolis's Administrators Guild of America, per PEOPLE.

Clooney has blamed himself for underperforming within the comedian book-based flick different occasions, too. In December 2023, he informed Leisure Tonight that he didn't plan to play Batman ever once more.

"I don't suppose there are sufficient medication on the earth for me to return once more," the two-time Oscar winner cracked, though he did present up as Batman alter ego Bruce Wayne in that yr's The Flash.

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