If the cinema adaptation ofAmerican Psycho is a classic, it is undoubtedly thanks to Christian Bale’s disturbing performance. However, at the start of filming, the actor was far from unanimous among the rest of the cast made up of Chloë Sevigny, Josh Lucas and Reese Witherspoon.
Worse still, the other actors had come to wonder why director Mary Harron had insisted so much on offering him the leading role. A great moment of incomprehension that Chloë Sevigny remembers very well.
“I tried to respect his method. Which I found difficult because I’m very gregarious, stupid and goofy, which the general public doesn’t know. When people take themselves too seriously, I shut down,” she told Vanity Fair.
What Chloë Sevigny and her colleagues did not know was that Christian Bale was a supporter of the Actors Studio method, and therefore remained in his role outside of filming.
The method
“I was really intimidated by his process and intimidated by him,” Chloë Sevigny continued. “And I wanted a little more generosity to make me feel more comfortable, which fits my personality.” It was a very empowering dynamic for me, but I don’t think I thought he was bad. I was just a little lost. I didn’t even know what the Actors Studio was. I was unfamiliar with this approach and it was very intimidating. »
A disorder which undoubtedly served the film, as it was necessary to establish a growing unease and tension in this adaptation of the classic by Bret Easton Ellis whose protagonist is characterized by a total lack of empathy.
The worst actor
Finally, if Chloë Sevigny wanted to clarify that she did not think she found Christian Bale “bad”, that was apparently the opinion of the entire cast at the time. A fact that the actor became aware of much later, when he crossed paths with Josh Lucas again on another film.
“He informed me that all the other actors thought I was the worst actor they had ever seen,” he told MovieMaker a few years ago. “He told me they looked at me and said, ‘Why did Mary Harron fight for this guy? He’s horrible.’ »
