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‘It Was Never Gonna Work’: Alex Garland Almost Hired Jake Gyllenhaal In His Oscar Winning Debut Ex Machina
Jake Gyllenhaal almost got signed to play the lead in the Oscar-winning film Ex Machina to secure finances! The creators revealed why the decision didn't feel right and more!
Ex-Machina director Alex Garland and producer Andrew Macdonald were pushed to consider Jake Gyllenhaal as the lead of their Oscar-winning flick to secure financing! During a Q&A session at this year’s Edinburgh Film Festival, Macdonald revealed that “the sales companies wanted us to cast Jake Gyllenhaal because he was bankable and they could sell foreign territories.”
Although the producer admitted that the casting would have changed the whole film, it ultimately didn’t go as planned due to flimsy negotiations with the actor’s reps. “I remember having a conversation with Jake Gyllenhaal’s lawyer about his needs. It was never gonna work,” he added.
Alicia Vikander and Oscar Isaac were the final cast of Ex Machina. Although both are renowned actors now, they didn’t carry enough weight to “raise the money through international sales” at the time. As a result, the creators decided to turn to Hollywood for funding, which they claim helped them pull in collaborators.
Ultimately, they made the film with Universal International, who already had a movie with Issac and Vikander, which had great promise, so they also backed Ex Machina. Little did they know, the latter would become a critically acclaimed film and bring loads of profit.
The film’s director praised his “young and hard-working and committed” cast and “friendly” crew who believed in the project.
Garland also gave insight into the film’s disco dancing scene, where the mad billionaire Nathan (Issac) breaks into a spontaneous dance with his human android, played by Sonoya Mizuno.
The director revealed that he added the now viral scene as an attempt to break the monotony of the film, which he felt was present in his previous movie, Never Let Me Go. “The reason that the Ex Machina disco dancing scene exists is because of Never Let Me Go. I thought I had to disrupt what was happening in the film,” he added.
Garland revealed that he never had any intent behind that dance except to “disrupt the tone,” and he voiced that sentiment from the beginning. “I had to seek out to disrupt the tone. And it turned out to be a GIF,” he added.
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