Bradley Cooper Told A White Lie To Land Sex And The City Role

With roles in A Star Is Born, American Hustle, and Guardians of the Galaxy, to name just a few, Bradley Cooper has become one of the most recognizable names in Hollywood. However, as Sex and the City fans might recall, Cooper landed his first-ever onscreen gig on the hit HBO series, and the Oscar-winner reportedly lied to show bosses in order to land the role.

Speaking on Max’s And Just Like That...The Writers Room podcast, Sex and the City director and writer, Michael Patrick King, disclosed how Cooper managed to secure his Season 2 cameo. “Bradley Cooper — first job — said he could drive a stick to get the job because the character drove a Karmann Ghia,” King claimed. “4:00 in the morning, another Friday outside 14th Street and I said, ‘Bradley, this is where you drive, you take off.’ And he goes, ‘I can’t drive a stick.’” Rather than replacing Cooper in the role, King revealed that they “pivoted” from the original script by having Sarah Jessica Parker’s character, Carrie Bradshaw, crawl “out of the Karmann Ghia and walk herself home.”

Cooper appeared in the Season 2 episode “They Shoot Single People, Don't They?” as a character named Jake, who runs into Carrie (Parker) following a humiliating magazine shoot.

The Hangover star is far from the only major name to have made a Sex and the City cameo. Throughout the show’s six-season run, the likes of Jennifer Coolidge, Heidi Klum, Matthew McConaughey, Lucy Liu, Elizabeth Banks, and many more, appeared as guest stars.

During an appearance on the And Just Like That...The Writers Room podcast, lead star Parker revealed “the hardest” part about having guest stars on the show.

“There’s so many people that have come onto our show — some for five hours, some for five days, some for two days,” the actor explained. “There is to me nothing harder than stepping onto a moving train where everybody knows literally all the ball bearings of the machinery ... and they’re joking and talking and reading before and talking and laughing, someone calls action we’re like … it’s the level of comfort.”