The release of Gladiator II allows you to discover some little secrets about the original film, released 24 years ago. But beneath the muscle and the sweat, there was visibly fear, on Joaquin Phoenix's side anyway.
Ridley Scott thus revealed to New York Times that the actor playing the villain Commodus had completely chickened out at the start of filming, much to the chagrin of Russell Crowe, who played the slave Maximus.
“Joaquin was in his prince costume and said 'I can't do it.' I said, “What?” And Russell said: 'That's really unprofessional,'” the 82-year-old director confided.
Large format shooting
Joaquin Phoenix had also mentioned in 2018, in the media Collider, this intimidating experience in the grandeur of ancient Rome.
“The first set I went on was huge. It seemed like there were acres of land, tons of trucks and trailers and hundreds of extras, multiple cameras… Suddenly the scale of it hit me and I was overwhelmed,” confessed the interpreter of Joker: madness for two.
Fortunately, the director was able to find the words to convince his actor to stay. “I can play the role of big brother or father. But I'm a friend of Joaquin. Gladiator was a baptism of fire for both of us at the beginning,” says the man who gave the actor a role in another major film, the historical drama Napoleonin 2023.
In any case, the Oscar duel, where the two headliners were nominated, was won by Russell Crowe.
