Production on a new biopic about the legendary football coach and broadcaster John Madden is underway. But the word on the street is that most of the drama is happening behind the camera, and at least one of the supporting actors has already walked off the project.
According to TMZ, at least five members of the cast and crew of the film, starring Nicolas Cage and Christian Bale, have made disturbing claims about director David O. Russell. They claim Russell used the N-word on the set while coaching a supporting actor on an unscripted monologue. The sources say hearing the slur was so upsetting that the unnamed actor and others walked off the set before production wrapped for the day. The incident comes after that same actor expressed being uncomfortable with a locker room scene that required full-frontal nudity.
However, some unnamed sources representing Amazon Studios say all of the drama is much ado about nothing, maintaining that they have no idea what caused the exodus from the set. They told TMZ that it was the actor’s idea to use the N-word in the first place and that Russell never used the slur himself.
The same sources added that the nude scene had been discussed in advance and an intimacy coach was available on set to help the actor feel more comfortable during filming. But when he refused to participate, they claim Russell told the actor he didn’t have to take part. They say “the door is open” for the actor to come back to the set.
While all of the details about what happened on this set still aren’t clear, we know that David O. Russell has had on-set issues with actors in the past. PageSix reported on a fist fight he had with actor George Clooney on the set of the 1999 war film “Three Kings” after Clooney got fed up with the way Russell treated certain members of the cast and crew.
“Five months out of your life is a lot. And so it’s not just like, ‘Oh, I’m going to go do a really good film, like ‘Three Kings,’ and I’m going to have a miserable f*k like David O. Russell making my life hell. Making every person on the crew’s life hell.’ It’s not worth it,” Clooney told GQ in a 2024 interview. “Not at this point in my life. Just to have a good product.”
