Iron Man actor Terrence Howard has claimed Robert Downey Jr "pushed him out" of the lucrative superhero franchise, and "took [his] money" at the same time.
Howard played Lt. Colonel James Rhodes in the first Iron Man film, opposite Downey's Tony Stark, but was replaced by Don Cheadle for Iron Man 2 and 3. At the time it was reported that Howard's salary was the highest of the entire cast, and he refused to take a "50 and 80 percent pay cut" for the second film, with Howard's "difficult behaviour" on set compounding issues.
However, while appearing as a guest on the Bravo TV chat show Watch What Happens: Live to promote The Best Man Holiday, Howard directly accused Downey of sabotaging his return to the Iron Man role. ""It turns out that the person that I helped become Iron Man, when it was time to […] re-up for the second one took the money that was supposed to go to me and pushed me out."
After saying he had originally signed to a three-picture deal, Howard said: "They came to me [for] the second and said, 'We will pay you one-eighth of what we contractually had for you, because we think the second one will be successful with or without you.' And I called my friend that I helped get the first job, and he didn't call me back for three months."
Howard won the role in Iron Man shortly after appearing in the acclaimed hip-hop drama Hustle & Flow, for which he received an Oscar nomination for best actor, and performed on It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp which won the Oscar for best original song in 2006.
• Terrence Howard interviewed in 2008
• Peter Bradshaw's review of Iron Man
