Famously ill-tempered director David O. Russell can be tough on his actors while shooting, and it’s a method that unnerved Melissa Leo (though it inspired her Oscar-winning performance in The Fighter), caused James Caan to quit one of his films, provoked a fight between himself and George Clooney, and made Lily Tomlin into a viral-video superstar after her R-rated rant on the set of I Heart Huckabees leaked online. Needless to say, then, Paul Reubens was a bit apprehensive when he showed up to work on the first day of O. Russell’s aborted Jake Gyllenhaal comedy Nailed. “I kept wondering, ‘Who’s seen that video of him screaming at everybody?’” Reubens recalled at South by Southwest this weekend. “And when I got there, I felt like every single person that was connected to the movie had seen that video already. And by the way, my first day on the movie, he was screaming at me at the top of his lungs. I couldn’t believe it. I was sitting there, and he was cursing and screaming on the first take.” What provoked O. Russell’s ire? “I don’t think it was reality-based,” Reubens laughed. “I don’t know why he screamed at me. I did my first line in the first rehearsal and he started screaming like, ‘What do I have to do to get the performance I want out of you!’ And I was like, ‘Not that.’” [Playlist/Indiewire]
