David Hayter has long been known as the voice of Solid Snake, right up until the release of 2014’s Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes and last year’s Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, where he was replaced by Kiefer Sutherland. In a recent no holds barred interview with Game Informer, Hayter let loose that both Konami and Kojima Productions had tried to get rid of him before.
Hayter candidly told Game Informer that he had to re-audition for his coveted role in 2004’s Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Apparently Hideo Kojima was trying to get Kurt Russell to voice the role, but Russell declined the opportunity. This isn’t entirely out of left field though as the Solid Snake character is a direct homage to Russel’s portrayal of Snake Plissken, from 1981’s action flick, Escape from New York. He reprised the role for Escape from LA in 1996, but we won’t talk about that one.
Hayter went on to explain how things went down when he learned that he was out as Snake for the role in Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain. Replaced by Keifer Sutherland, he had a small amount of sympathy for the actor when Fox revealed plans to reboot the TV action show 24 with an all-new cast. Sutherland had played lead character Jack Bauer for all of its nine seasons so was faced with a very similar situation.
Hayter also patently dismissed the idea that he will team up with Kojima again, now that Kojima has left Konami. There’s no love lost between the two as Hayter stated “I’ve got no particular love for Kojima.”
He was asked if he’d tried his hand at Metal Gear Solid V and jokingly let go that it would be “60 hours of humiliation that I can’t get to.”