(CNN) -- Ricky Gervais says he's not sure if the lead in "Ghost Town" -- an anti-social, cynical dentist named Bertram Pincus -- was written for him. Ricky Gervais has established a career playing characters with an abrasive edge. And he's not sure if he wants to know. "I'm scared to ask," he says in a phone interview from Los Angeles, California. "[Writer-director David Koepp] says that when they first had the idea, that it should be played by me, [and] they never looked back. Now I don't know whether that was as they were coming up with it, or whether it was because they found out no one else was available. Steve Carell had said no, Will Ferrell had said no, Jack Black had said no, Ben Stiller had said no ... everyone had said no, and they went, 'Oh, is there no one ... I wonder if HE'S available.'
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Ricky Gervais plays misanthropic dentist in "Ghost Town," now out on DVD
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Role was "me," he says, "something I could have written"
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Gervais rose to fame with UK "Office," "Extras"
"Ghost Town" was a good fit, he says, because he and @placeholder hit it off so well.