Anna Kendrick and Jake Gyllenhaal Kept Holding Hands and Snuggling While Filming ‘End of Watch’
Jake Gyllenhaal worked alongside Pitch Perfect alum Anna Kendrick in the feature End of Watch. Playing lovers, Kendrick admitted that her onscreen relationship with Gyllenhaal perhaps became a bit too real.
Anna Kendrick and Jake Gyllenhaal starred in ‘End of Watch’
Gyllenhaal and Kendrick both co-starred in the David Ayer film End of Watch. Gyllenhaal played a police officer in the 2012 feature alongside Michael Peña. Kendrick played Gyllenhaal’s love interest in the film. The movie was shot in a found-footage style. This gave Ayer’s project a more natural feel than Kendrick was used to.
“It certainly created one of the most interesting atmospheres on set that I’ve ever experienced. One in which you were never really sure if you were being filmed or not, so it was weirdly liberating and challenging at the same time, in this wonderful way where you were in character for 12 hours a day,” Kendrick once told IGN.
This meant that Gyllenhaal and Kendrick were constantly showing intimacy towards each other.
“The only time we weren’t holding hands, snuggling or whatever the scene called for was at lunch. If there was ever a point that we realized that every other camera was re-loading then Jake or Michael would grab the handheld and we would just film something,” Kendrick recalled. “Jake would pull me aside and he would grab the handheld camera and start doing something, and then David would notice that we were in the corner and come over and start filming, and we wouldn’t have noticed for a solid 5 minutes that they’d been filming us, until Dave yells out ‘kiss her!’”
Jake Gyllenhaal eventually felt like Anna Kendrick’s real-life boyfriend in ‘End of Watch’
It’s unclear if Kendrick and Gyllenhaal ever actually dated in real life. But on the set of End of Watch, Gyllenhaal felt like Kendrick’s true partner after several readings with her co-star.
“It was interesting for me because it was one of those weird life imitating art situations where all of my rehearsals were with just Jake. So I’ve met Mike [Peña] and I’ve met Natalie [Martinez], but I didn’t know them well at all, so when I came to set it really felt like my new boyfriend introducing me to his good friends,” she said.
The Twilight: New Moon star credited Gyllenhaal for creating that kind of believable intimacy between them.
“I really followed his lead on that,” she said. “I’m really glad that he was so open and giving on that end, just like somebody who wants to reach inside you and rip you open in this really incredible way. He was so deep in the s*** by the time that I got there that he was completely mentally there all day every day. So when I showed up and he was holding my hand the entire time I was like ‘this is weird right?’”
Anna Kendrick was ‘pissed’ at Jake Gyllenhaal for dropping out of ‘Into the Woods’
Kendrick and Gyllenhaal almost teamed up for another film after End of Watch. Into the Woods was a 2014 Disney musical that starred Emily Blunt. The feature was rounded out by an ensemble cast that included Meryl Streep, Chris Pine, and Anna Kendrick. Gyllenhaal was supposed to be a part of the ensemble, but he had to bow out of the project. His schedule with Nightcrawler ended up clashing with his Into the Woods obligations. Kendrick was extremely disappointed with Gyllenhaal dropping out of the project.
“I was so pissed at Jake, let me tell you,” she once told The Daily Beast. “I texted him and said, ‘You’re abandoning me, and I’m never going to forgive you!’”
Kendrick joked that she soon relaxed after seeing the film Gyllenhaal left Woods for.
“And then I saw the trailer to Nightcrawler and texted him again and said, ‘Wow, you inspire me every day,’” she said.
