Behind the glamorous world of Hollywood, there is a grotesque reality that barely anyone talks about. The actors do not just work hard to ace their performances; sometimes they even have to go through terrible working conditions, which sometimes even include being ill-treated by the filmmakers.
There have been incidents that proved that getting a safe working place is still a distant dream. Previously, Tom Hanks candidly shared his experience of being poorly treated during a film’s production. This narrative echoes the sentiments of legendary filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock, who unabashedly admitted to mistreating the actors who worked with him.
Tom Hanks reflected on his not-so-good experience working with Clint Eastwood
Tom Hanks has appeared in some of the most iconic films throughout his career. And once the actor collaborated with the legendary director Clint Eastwood and gave a blockbuster film Sully, in which Hanks played the lead role of Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the pilot who successfully executed the emergency landing of a US Airways Flight on the Hudson River in 2009. Though the film was a great success both critically and financially, the process of filming the movie was not very great for Hanks.
Previously, Tom Hanks appeared on The Graham Norton Show and shared that Eastwood often gets insensitive to the actors working for him. The actor claimed,
“He treats his actors like horses because when he did the 60s series Rawhide, the director would shout ‘Action!’ and all the horses bolted. So when he’s in charge, he says in a really quiet soft voice, ‘All right, go ahead,’ and instead of shouting ‘Cut!’ he says ‘That’s enough of that.’ It’s intimidating as hell!”
Eastwood’s unconventional and subdued approach to directing was highly condemned by the actor.
Surprisingly, this isn’t the first time someone has pointed out unconventional work practices within the film industry. Earlier, the late director Alfred Hitchcock shed light on how he treated his collaborators, and his narrative was indeed terrible.
Alfred Hitchcock admitted to treating his collaborators poorly
In Hollywood, the pursuit of a safe workplace for creativity and collaboration often clashes with the stark truth that not all that glitters is gold. Filmmakers like Alfred Hitchcock regarded the actors who collaborated with them with disdain. This dismissive attitude became evident when, in an interview, Hitchcock derogatorily referred to actors as “cattle.” Earlier, the filmmaker appeared on The Dick Cavett Show back in 1972. During the interview, the director said,
“Well, I think at the time, I think I said, or I was accused of calling actors cattle, and I said that I would never say such an unfeeling, rude thing about actors at all. What I probably said was that all actors should be treated like cattle.”
Hitchcock’s statement shows the bitter truth of the film industry, where actors’ talent is often overshadowed by their role being reduced to mere labor for filmmakers. While such remarks are often laughed off, this abhorrent talk at workplaces should be highly condemned.
Source: Slash Film, The Guardian
