 According to John Hurt (qv) in the DVD Documentary, he was  considered at the beginning of casting to play Kane but had already  committed to another film that was set to take place in South  Africa, so John Finch got the role instead. However, two separate  incidents occurred which got Hurt the role. First was the fact that  he was banned from South Africa because the country mistook him for  actor John Herd who strongly opposed the Apartied (Hurt points out  that he was opposed to it too, but was lucky enough not to get  blacklisted) so he was unable to do the other film. Second, actor  John Finch became seriously ill from diabetes and had to pull out.  Ridley Scott immediately contacted Hurt, pitched him the script over  a weekend and John Hurt arrived on the set Monday morning with  little to no sleep to begin filming.