The Director That Tom Hardy Once Rubbed the Wrong Way
Inception actor Tom Hardy has collaborated with several filmmakers over the years. But because of his personality, the actor admitted there was one filmmaker he didn’t get along with earlier in his career.
Nicolas Winding Refn cast Tom Hardy in ‘Bronson’
In 2008, Oscar-nominee Tom Hardy was cast as the titular character in the critically acclaimed biographical film Bronson. The movie followed real-life prisoner Charles Bronson who was once known as Britain’s most violent criminal.
Getting the cast right for Refn’s project proved to be a challenging ordeal for the director. At first he tried to recruit Hobbs and Shaw star Jason Statham for the role. But Statham politely declined the opportunity.
“I really tried to get Jason, but he loved our meeting and then got the script and was like ‘yeah man, I don’t know what to tell you.’ And it was a shame because at that time, getting Jason Statham in a movie like this was gonna make you a millionaire, but it didn’t turn out that way which was probably the right thing to do,” Refn once said in an interview with IndieWire.
He also met with other actors like Guy Pearce who also turned down the feature. Eventually, the director would land on Hardy. But in order to work together, the two had to get over their mutual dislike for each other.
Nicolas Winding Refn and Tom Hardy didn’t like each other when they first worked together
Refn initially turned down Hardy for the role after first meeting the actor. This was in large part due to their personalities clashing.
“I don’t drink alcohol and he was an ex-alcoholic, and we met at a wine bar in London which is the worst place you could meet in. And I don’t think we very much liked each other, so that was that,” Refn said.
But after a rough time finding the right actor for Bronson, the Drive director decided to meet Hardy a second time. Thanks to their second meeting, the two ended up working together. But the Warrior star asserted they were still argumentative on set.
“We just rubbed each other the wrong way and continued to rub each other the wrong way,” Hardy once confided to Interview Magazine.
At the time, however, Hardy learned to work with Refn despite their tension.
“Yeah, it’s often the way with collaborations when you work with desperately individual people and then put them together as a team there are going to be fireworks or disgruntlement and we had our fair share of disagreements, but having said that I loved working with Nic and I would love to work with him again,” Hardy continued. “I know that I’m going to have an argument with him, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. He challenges me and I like to think I challenge him.”
Tom Hardy once shared he had no plans of working with Nicolas Winding Refn ever again
The Venom actor might have changed his mind a bit on the topic of working alongside Refn. In a 2014 Reddit AMA, Hardy was asked if he ever saw himself working with the filmmaker after doing Bronson. Hardy didn’t mince words with his response.
“No, I don’t plan on ever doing any work with Refn again, I think he’s better off where he is, doing well without me,” he stated.
