David Fincher is infamous for being a very meticulous, detail-oriented filmmaker. Over the years, actors and crew members have spoken out about how difficult it is to work with the director because of his propensity for forcing people to do dozens of takes for a scene. So, it shouldn’t be a surprise that this carried over to “Mank,” his upcoming Netflix feature.
Speaking to Total Film, Fincher and his cast talked about the process of creating the film, especially when it comes to the number of takes. The filmmaker explained that even though he has an incredible cast for “Mank,” he still wanted to make sure he got the very best take out of them, especially from his star, Gary Oldman.
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“It was exhausting in the beginning, I think, for [Oldman],” Fincher said. “Because I’m fairly didactic about, ‘These are the things that the scene needs to accomplish for me, and we will continue to play, to look for ways to underline these ideas that are as subtle as we can make them.’”
He continued, “It’s a hard thing to say to actors, ‘I want a cohesive, great performance in the master [shot]. And then I want a cohesive, great performance in the alternate master. And then I want a cohesive, great performance in the over-the-shoulder. And I want a cohesive, great performance in his over-the-shoulder onto you. And then I want the singles.’ Because I don’t want to cut a scene based on where you are at personally on Tuesday. I don’t think I could go into the edit room knowing that I was going to have to cut around somebody who didn’t deliver. Part of it is you cast really great people and get the fuck out of the way!”
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This exhaustion was echoed by actor Charles Dance, who worked with Oldman in many of the “Mank” scenes. Dance described one instance where Fincher made the cast do more than 100 takes.
“We did take after take after take after take,” Dance said. “And [Oldman] said to David at one point, ‘David, I’ve done this scene a hundred fucking times.’ And Fincher said, ‘Yeah, I know, but this is 101. Reset!’”
The sentiment was also confirmed by cast member Amanda Seyfried. She described the directing style as something akin to the film “Groundhog Day” and said that it was “definitely hard.” However, judging by Fincher’s features, this is a style that results in something special more times than not.
If you live in one of the few areas where Netflix is releasing “Mank” in theaters, you can see it beginning this weekend. For the rest of us, we have to wait until the streaming release on December 4.