Badmovies.org Forum

I'm sure you've all heard stories of actors demanding this and that on the set.

Actors who are like babies and make a scene until they get what they want.
Or they're just plain pricks because it's in their nature and they've always been that way.

For example:  
I read that while filming the 2001 movie "The Score", Marlon Brando refused to be on set at the same time as director Frank Oz.  It said that Brando referred to Oz as "Miss Piggy" (Oz did the voice of Miss Piggy on the muppet show) and would tease him with lines like "Don't you wish I was a puppet, so you could control me."  Robert DeNiro was forced to direct Brando instead with Oz giving him instructions through a headset.

It's this kind of behavior I'm talking about.

Any other actors you can think of who you've heard are particularly difficult to work with?

I heard that Liv Tyler was IMMPOSBLE to work with on the set of Peter Jackson's ( disaster ) Lord of the Rings trilogy. She was SO hard to get along with that scenes were cut from the origional print in order to put HER into MORE scenes! So, the movies SHOULD be renamed Liv Tyler Plays and Elf -  part I, II & III

Brando is notoriously difficult to work with. James Dean was reportedly hard to work with on Giant, not getting on well with Rock Hudson or George Stevens. Supposedly he whipped out little jimmy and relieved himself in front of the entire company for a scene.

Alan Ladd was difficult to work with, not always because of his behavior, but because of his size. Ladd was only a few inches over 5 feet tall and being a movie tough guy in the 40's required he be taller than his leading ladies. So directors were challanged with ways of making Ladd seem less diminutive. They dug trenches for other actors to stand in and actually put Ladd on a box. I've watched closely and I've never seen a scene with Alan ladd and his leading lady  in close proximity in which you can see their lower bodies.

John Barrymore when not passed out drunk or chasing the script girl, often had to use cue cards that were pasted all over the set.

I've also heard that Edward Norton can be extrememly moody and will not perform if he isn't feeling just right.

Gene hackman, I read about his actions on 'the quick and the dead" , so sam had to spend a good 20 minutes to get him to do what he was suppossed to.

all he had to do was exit a bar tip his hat to a guy and sit down in a chair.

Y'know, people underestimate the difficulty of hat tipping. I've worn many hats in my day, and just as there are many hats, there are many hat tipping styles. Hackman's a method actor, he probably just wanted to get a feel for his character's motivation for the tipping O' the hat. And as for the sitting down bit, well...don't get me started.

I have always assumed that Russell Crowe was one tough guy to work with. He seems difficult in real life and it leads me believe he would be awful to work with  as well.

I know that Val Kilmer and Bruce Willis are difficult to work with (not through personal experience, you understand!).  If a director isn't top-notch, they can dominate the film in ways entirely unwanted (e.g. "Dr.  Moreau", "Bonfire").  However, if the director is either ruthless, aggressive or brilliant - or a combination of these factors - Val and Bruce can pull the stops out (e.g. "Heat", "12 Monkeys").

Given that it is now possible to replace an actor entirely with CGI (e.g. Oliver Reed, "Gladiator"), the days of tantrum-throwing stars exploiting their uniqueness may be on the wane ...

Klaus Kinski has to be the all-time champion...check out Werner Herzog's MY BEST FIEND for evidence.  The tribemen extras in FITZCARRALDO asked Herzog if he wanted them to kill Kinski....and there is one story about Herzog forcing Kinski back to the set at gunpoint during the shoot for AGUIRRE, but I think that story has been exaggerated over the years.

Heard a great story about the young Dennis Hopper. He was doing this movie with Henry Hathaway, a director with a bad attitude as well (somebody who worked with him in Mexico, I think, said that the studio had this plane waiting on the airport just for the people he fired and had to return to the U.S., and they called it "The Hathaway Plane", just imagine). So Hopper was deliberately behaving like a rebel-without-a-cause during the whole shooting without Hathaway saying a thing.

Then Hathaway booked the whole morning of the last day to shoot a scene with Hopper. And everytime Hopper finished, he would ask him to do it again and again, but without telling him what he exactly wanted (if he wanted anything at all, that is). Young Hopper was reported to start crying and shouting the stone-faced Hathaway: "Just tell me how you want me to do the scene!!" for the whole morning.

I heard that Steve McQueen caused a lot of headaches. He was very arrogant and would often show up on the set several hours late, messing up the shooting schedule.

Sean Young is rumored to be a b***h.

Geez... You've gotta be a stone-cold psychopath to be able to dominate a crying, screaming Dennis Hopper!

I've heard that Lucy Liu and Bill Murray HATE one another after shooting Charlie's angels

I've heard that Lucy Liu and Bill Murray HATE one another after shooting Charlie's angels

I'd sotra be interested in knowing why.  Bill Murray strikes me as the type that rarely seems serious even when he's trying to do something seriously, which I think could infuriate somebody who was actually trying to take things seriously.

Orson Welles and Peter Sellers in "Casino Royale." For whatever reason, they just hated each other, and would not work in the presence of each other. So, when they had to shoot scenes of them together, they would shoot Orson with a stand-in for Peter, then Orson would walk off the set, Peter would come on, and they shoot Peter with a stand-in for Orson.

Marilyn Monroe. Because she kept flubbing her lines, during the shooting of a film.

Burt Ward. "Batman." It got so bad, that they started shooting around him, because everybody hated working with him so. Of course, he was difficult, because this was his first big role, and he was insecure.

I am sure there are, were, and will be other difficult actors to work with.

I've heard stories from the '80s of how Jane Seymour was a real b***h, but also how she's become a much nicer person to work with in recent years.

I remember hearing that Demi Moore was a b***h on the set of some movie and she had all these crazy demands. One of her demands was that they had to build a special filter in the walls of her trailer so the water that came out of the shower for her was Evain.

I just finished working with Demi Moore and she was wonderful to work with.  I too heard the stories from others who worked with her and i was a bit affraid.  But she was great.  Never a cross word...very professional...Enthusiastic about the project.
I'd work with her anytime.

Speaking of the original batman series, I heard that Otto Preminger, who played the second Mr' Freeze, was such an ahole that they got eli wallach to do freeze's third appearance.

 Also, Tellulah bankhead purportedly ragged on adam west virtually every second she was on the set.

I heard an interview on Howard Stern with Robert Duvall where they talked about Bill Murry being impossible to work with. I remember Chevy Chase saying something to the same effect.

Wow.. Joan Crawford not mentioned yet?
Strangely, the one movie I know of where she didn't play a b*tch, MILDRED PIERCE, was my favorite movie of hers!
Her problems to begin with are legendary, but her clashes with Bette Davis are really impressive.

From what I've heard and read, Bill Murray is a nice guy for the most part but if you p**s him off, he STAYS p**sed.

Yul Brenner could be difficult; he and Steve McQueen hated each other while making Magnificent Seven because they both thought they were the primary star.  Barbara Bouchet, his costar in the movie Death Rage, was so disgusted by the way he treated the crew that she sent him a big bouquet of flowers that he was allergic to.  :twirl:

I've heard that Peter Sellers once refused to do a scene because someone of the crew had the wrong colour of jumper.

I would think Christian Bale if you ever heard his tirade on the set of Terminator: Salvation when he went off severely on the Director of Photography when he was trying to check the lighting while Mr. Bale was trying to get into character for a shot. Then, I read later that the two get along just fine and neither has bad feelings about the incident.

I knew an old guy who used to work for Patty Duke.  He said she was intollerable. 

The Belush! Just ask David Cross :wink:

Christopher Lee seems like this, like when he refused to say any lines in Dracula Prince of darkness.