The 1994 Western film's director Ed Zwick recalls their dustup on the set of the movie, where the Hollywood star played Tristan Ludlow in the flick to replace Tom Cruise.
- Feb 7, 2024
AceShowbiz - Brad Pitt was accused of showing a "volatile" behavior on the set of his 1994 Western film "Legends of the Fall". Making the damning allegations in his memoir was none other than the movie's director, Ed Zwick.
In an excerpt from "Hits, Flops, and Other Illusions: My Fortysomething Years in Hollywood", Zwick recalled the time when he and the Hollywood actor worked together for the movie. The filmmaker claimed that the 60-year-old star "can be volatile when riled."
Published by Vanity Fair, the excerpt saw Zwick claiming that the "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" actor "would get edgy whenever he was about to shoot a scene that required him to display deep emotion."
Zwick additionally recounted one of their on-set "dustups" in the book. "I don’t know who yelled first, who swore, or who threw the first chair. Me, maybe? But when we looked up, the crew had disappeared. And this wasn't the last time it happened," he penned.
The star was cast to play Tristan Ludlow in the flick to replace Tom Cruise. It was said that the actor's agent told Zwick that "Brad wanted to quit" after the first table read. Thankfully, producer Marshall Herskovitz eventually convinced him to stay.
"It was the first augury of the deeper springs of emotion roiling inside Brad. He seems easygoing at first, but he can be volatile when riled, as I was to be reminded more than once as shooting began and we took each other's measure," Zwick said.
Zwick went on to suggest that they had different creative visions about his character. "Sometimes, no matter how experienced or sensitive you are as a director, things just aren't working His ideas about Tristan differed from mine," Zwick explained.
"Brad had grown up with men who held their emotions in check; I believed the point of the [Legends of the Fall] novel was that a man's life was the sum of his griefs... Yet the more I pushed Brad to reveal himself, the more he resisted. So, I kept pushing and Brad pushed back," he said.
The director shared that he once gave Pitt a direction in front of the crew, which he admitted was "a stupid, shaming provocation," and that prompted the actor to come "back at me, also out loud, telling me to back off." He added, "The considered move would have been to tell the crew to take five and for the two of us to talk it out. But I was feeling bloody-minded, and not about to relent."
"I was angry at Brad for not trusting me to influence his performance. Also for the reluctance he’d shown after the first table read. Who knows, I might even have been acting out my own inability to be vulnerable," he divulged. "But Brad wasn’t about to give in without a fight. In his defense, I was pushing him to do something he felt was either wrong for the character, or more 'emo' than he wanted to appear onscreen." Zwick, however, noted that they would "make up and mean it" even after blowing at each other.
Neither Pitt nor his rep has responded to the claims.
