James Corden says he narrowly missed out on playing the lead role in Oscar-tipped film ‘The Whale’.

‘The Late Late Show’ host, 44, told Deadline he was going to be its star if it had been directed by Tom Ford, but admitted he may have been “too young” to do the part of a tormented obese teacher justice, which has been played by Brendan Fraser.

He said: “I was going to play that part, and Tom Ford was going to direct.”

James added George Clooney was once attached to the project, with Deadline reporting the film’s director Darren Aronofsky had confirmed James' claims.

Deadline added George only wanted to be involved if a real-life 600-pound man “unknown” in the acting world could be found for the role of Charlie, for which Brendan is one of the favourites for a best actor Oscar.

James also recently revealed he auditioned for the part of hobbit Samwise Gamgee in ‘The Lord of the Rings’ film trilogy, but he failed to get a call back.

He said on the ‘Happy Sad Confused’ podcast about the experience: “Not good.

Every single person in London auditioned for ‘Lord of The Rings’, everybody, and I auditioned for Samwise.

“I was doing the accent and everything... ‘Mr. Frodo!’ Two of my other friends went in.

“And then we all got called back the next day, and then we got called back the next day, and then none of us got called back after that.”

The part eventually went to Sean Astin, and James is preparing to exit ‘The Late Late Show’ this year to return to Britain with his family and is said to be eyeing up more acting roles after starring in Amazon Prime’s ‘Mammals’ series.