There are few working actors who have earned quite the same high pedigree as Joaquin Phoenix. The Oscar-winning thespian is among the most versatile and volatile performers of the modern age, and he has received no shortage of acclaim for his impactful, compelling, soulful, and immersive performances. But he has also earned a reputation for being an actor with a temperament, and someone who doesn’t always make the filmmaking process go smoothly. Indeed, you can’t deny the results, but sometimes, as collaborators have noted, you need to work with him intently and, sometimes, even combatively in order to receive such great, thunderous performances. Currently, we don’t know what’s in store for Phoenix’s much-anticipated portrayal of Napoleon Bonaparte in Ridley Scott’s Napoleon, but the reuniting actor-director ultimately shared an unorthodox creative partnership, particularly with the filmmaker allowing the celebrated performer to help retool the script to accommodate the star’s take on the tyrannical emperor.
As Scott noted to Empire, the experience of reteaming with Phoenix on this upcoming Apple TV+ movie was “one of my most challenging but also one of my best experiences, with any actor.” More than two decades after their work together on Gladiator, for which Phoenix received his first Oscar nomination, the actor’s process has certainly become more invigorated and involved, and Scott went to incredible lengths in order to realize the film centered around Phoenix’s performance. Namely, Scott allowed the actor to speak up whenever he felt “uncomfortable” with his character, and he retooled the movie during filming to allow the actor to realize the performance he wanted to give at the forefront of this new movie.
