Guardian.co.uk has just published a revealing interview titled, Jim Sturgess: a thoroughly polished survivor, where Jim discusses many aspects of his film career including his rise to fame after Across the Universe and 21, his upcoming films, The Way Back, One Day and Upside Down, and why he turned down the part of Spider-Man in the current Julie Taymor Broadway production.  Below is a brief excerpt, however you can read the entire article here.

The funny thing about Sturgess, now 29, is that he has already had a crack at the big time – a couple of years ago. It  just wasn’t to his liking. Rewind to 2007 when director Julie Taymor gave him an almighty break, as a mop-haired Liverpool shipyard worker in her sweetly uncynical Beatles-inspired musical, Across the Universe. Teenage girls in America were hopelessly devoted to the movie and for about five minutes Sturgess was the hot young Brit actor du jour – dish of the day. He thought he’d come home after shooting and life as an out-of-work actor would get back to normal. “But I had an American agent, and suddenly you’re getting invited into this Hollywood world.” He made a further two films almost immediately: The Other Boleyn Girl and 21, with Kevin Spacey.  At this point the cheesy high school scripts were piling in, then came the golden ticket: he was offered the lead in the Spider-Man musical, directed by Taymor and with music written by Bono and the Edge from U2, which opens in February on Broadway.

Sturgess turned it all down.  Why?  Because none of it felt right.  Which could sound a mite pretentious, but he tells the story matter-of-factly. “It was when 21 came out. I was in Los Angeles and my face was everywhere: on buses, on posters, on the side of buildings.”  Something didn’t connect he says.  “I didn’t feel that blown away by it. I was still hungry to prove myself.  I realised that quite quickly, that I had to find something that challenged me from an acting point of view.”