By now, Terrence Malick‘s tendency to enlist lots of big name stars to come hang out his sets, only to subsequently cut them out of the movie, is as legendary as his press shyness. In fact, we devoted a whole feature to that very topic. And his latest film, the divisive “To The Wonder” — listen to our podcast about it here — is no different. While the finished movie pivots around four characters played by Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko, Rachel McAdams and Javier Bardem, there were a handful who worked on the movie, in both big and small parts, that were ultimately cast aside including Rachel Weisz, Barry Pepper, Amanda Peet, Michael Sheen and Jessica Chastain. And now, you can add one more to that list.
Speaking with BlackBook, Michael Shannon revealed that he too shot some scenes for the movie that were ultimately excised. “I worked with Terrence Malick on ‘To the Wonder’—I got cut out—but it was still a fascinating experience. I spent a day down there walking around with Ben Affleck and doing these completely random scenes where the camera was just going all over the place, and you never knew where it was going to be, and during the scene people would be tapping you and telling you to go over here or go over there, say this or do that,” the actor shared.
And even more, when many of Malick’s cast members have speculated about the director’s freewheeling intentions, Shannon’s says he’s heard the man himself state what his process is all about. “And I’ve heard Malick say, ‘I’m just trying to find the spontaneous, I just want something truly spontaneous to happen.’ ” he said.
Well, too bad Shannon didn’t end up part of that spontaneous discovery when it came time to editing, but it’s still an interesting little curio for the Malick fans out there. Who will get cut next from Malick’s next couple of features — the untitled music scene flick and “Knight Of Cups” — remains to be seen, but we’ve just received some super exclusive footage of the director editing those movies right now. Watch below.
