Christian Bale‘s performance as Batman in Christopher Nolan‘s Dark Knight trilogy is critically acclaimed.

However, in the last few months we learned that he faced some competition from two other actors before he landed the role. Interestingly, those two stars are now sharing the screen in Oppenheimer – a new movie that is also from Christopher.

In a series of recent interviews, the acclaimed director opened up about the auditions, revealing how far they got and why they weren’t cast as the caped crusader.

Scroll through to find out who we recently learned was in the running to play Christian Bale in Batman Begins…