"This is why I go to therapy." Will Poulter takes a walk down memory lane as he rewatches scenes from his classic works including 'The Revenant,' 'Black Mirror: Bandersnatch,' 'The Bear,' 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,' 'Death of a Unicorn,' 'Midsommar, and 'Warfare.' Will dishes on receiving the 'Black Mirror' audition call in the most 'Black Mirror' fashion, fully punching Dave Bautista in the face on accident while filming 'Guardians of the Galaxy,' and so much more.
Director: Adam Lance Garcia
Director of Photography: Jack Belisle
Editor: Sammy Cortino
Talent: Will Poulter
Producer: Madison Coffey
Line Producer: Natasha Soto-Albors
Associate Producer: Zayna Allen
Production Manager: Andressa Pelachi
Production Coordinator: Elizabeth Hymes
Talent Booker: Lauren Mendoza
Camera Operator: Lucas Young
Gaffer: David Djaco
Audio Engineer: Sean Paulsen
Production Assistant: Karla Torres, Rafael Vasquez
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Supervising Editor: Christina Mankellow
Assistant Editor: Andy Morell
Director: Adam Lance Garcia
Director of Photography: Jack Belisle
Editor: Sammy Cortino
Talent: Will Poulter
Producer: Madison Coffey
Line Producer: Natasha Soto-Albors
Associate Producer: Zayna Allen
Production Manager: Andressa Pelachi
Production Coordinator: Elizabeth Hymes
Talent Booker: Lauren Mendoza
Camera Operator: Lucas Young
Gaffer: David Djaco
Audio Engineer: Sean Paulsen
Production Assistant: Karla Torres, Rafael Vasquez
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Supervising Editor: Christina Mankellow
Assistant Editor: Andy Morell
Category
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00And by the way, I'm like looking at this and I'm like,
00:02this is why I go to therapy.
00:04So I'm like, damn, there's some intense watches in here.
00:08Hi, I'm Will Poulter.
00:09And today we're going to be looking at some scenes
00:11from my career.
00:12Join me on an uncomfortable journey.
00:14That's some good pipe smoking.
00:33I was so cold.
00:34We shot this scene in the Canadian wilderness,
00:38which can be applied to 99% of the shots in The Revenant.
00:42Provided an amazing view over the wilderness below.
00:46We actually rehearsed virtually every scene
00:50months prior to shooting it.
00:52So we kind of showed up to each and every location
00:55and did like a camera rehearsal
00:57and then returned to that point.
00:59Some locations, although we'd rehearsed in them,
01:01were like unrecognizable months later
01:03because seasonally it was undergoing so much change.
01:06And quite honestly, like due to climate change as well,
01:09there were places where the reverse was happening.
01:13We'd show up and there wasn't enough snow.
01:13Naturally, we had to shoot the last section of the movie
01:17in the southern most tip of Argentina
01:19because we ran out of snow in Canada.
01:22Hey, answer me.
01:24It's your to ask your questions.
01:26Yeah, you're not going to win that fight.
01:28That's Tom Harding who probably beat you up.
01:30Why you left your little boyfriend running around?
01:32You don't know if he's still alive yet.
01:33That what you want to know?
01:35I'll tell you why.
01:36It's because you ain't a man yet.
01:38All right?
01:38It's because you were scared shitless.
01:40You're scared now.
01:40Now put your rifle down.
01:41Every take that Tom does is amazing.
01:46As Fitzgerald, he was just, he was incredible.
01:48And obviously at a certain point in the movie,
01:50we had a lot of stuff that was kind of like one-on-one
01:51and there was this constant tension
01:53between our two characters.
01:54And this really was the kind of point
01:55at which it sort of combusted.
01:58I remember this being like a scene in the calendar,
02:01which I was like really nervous about.
02:03And there was a lot of like buildup and kind of anxiety,
02:05you know, for me, because, you know,
02:08relatively like young actor opposite someone who,
02:10from a performance perspective,
02:12I kind of like really admired.
02:13You know, I honestly found in the context of The Revenant,
02:16in every case, I was opposite actors who were so good
02:19that they do the vast majority of the work for you.
02:21It's just about like reacting to what they're doing.
02:23Like Tom is such a powerful performer.
02:26You know, Leo is such a powerful performer.
02:29Donal is so intense too.
02:32And so it really just became about kind of like reacting
02:35to what they were doing.
02:36And that's not lip service.
02:37Like that genuinely was what it felt like.
02:39Right now, be honest, did you see him?
02:41Put your rifle down.
02:42Did you see the reed?
02:45No.
02:48Not a single one.
02:51There was like a general intensity that Fitzgerald had
02:53that kind of never waned.
02:55He just put so much doubt in my mind, you know,
02:58through his own confidence.
03:07Next time you want to shoot somebody,
03:08you might want to use the power to prime your rifle.
03:14I forgot.
03:15Like after this, then I go and try and tackle him.
03:17I really don't learn the lesser.
03:18It's quite dark,
03:19because I think like Bridger's at a point where he's like,
03:22I mean, he's certainly lost his mind.
03:24It's like at the end of his will to live sort of thing.
03:27But yeah, picking a fight with Tom Hardy's not smart.
03:32One for you, one for me.
03:36What is it?
03:38It lets you see the bigger picture.
03:41I was a huge Black Mirror fan.
03:43I thought it was absolutely incredible.
03:45And really weirdly, I hadn't watched it in a while.
03:51And it was around the time of lockdown.
03:54And I feel like I turned on the TV
03:56and I was like, oh, I'm going to watch Black Mirror.
03:58I'm going to watch it.
03:59I'm going to watch it.
04:00And I feel like I turned on my Netflix
04:02and I checked out an episode of Black Mirror
04:04and I was halfway through watching one.
04:05I paused it to take a call from my agent.
04:08And my agent said that the folks at Black Mirror
04:11had been in touch to see if I was available
04:14to shoot an episode.
04:15And I was like really terrified.
04:16I was like, one second.
04:18I was like, what the fuck is going on?
04:20I was like, yes, I'd love to audition, I think.
04:26Are they going to kill me?
04:28It was a very Black Mirror moment.
04:30I remember people making comments
04:32about how yellow my tongue was.
04:33And I'd downed several Red Bulls
04:35to try and simulate the experience of what I...
04:38I mean, listen, you're not going to trip out
04:40as you would on acid, I assume.
04:42But just to give me a little pep in my step,
04:44turned my tongue yellow.
04:45And I think I caught a lot of heat for that on light.
04:47One of the things that was pretty cool
04:48is that the lighting and the music
04:51that was being played live as well
04:54while we were acting on certain takes
04:57was really quite helpful.
04:59There's also like night shoot.
05:01Like night shoots, like a weird energy
05:03can sometimes consume you anyway.
05:05And you sort of find yourself slightly losing your mind,
05:07like find yourself sort of in a version of like tripping.
05:10David Slade, who directed this, who's amazing,
05:13was brilliant at like keeping the energy up
05:16and pushing us to keep going
05:18and do loads and loads of takes.
05:19We had a lot of fun with it.
05:20People think it's a happy game.
05:21It's not a happy game.
05:22It's a fucking nightmare world.
05:24And the worst thing is it's real and we live in it.
05:27I'm laughing only because it's a fucking nightmare world.
05:30It's like a descriptor for so many Black Mirror episodes.
05:32It's just like,
05:33it feels like straight out of Charlie's handbook.
05:35I'm actually not great with heights.
05:38In addition to the rigging and the wires,
05:40I feel like there was also some sort of platform
05:43erected underneath.
05:44So like we couldn't actually fall that far anyway.
05:47I can't really remember.
05:48I've still got a Red Bull hangover.
05:51Fair enough.
05:56See you around.
05:59Splat.
06:01The splat.
06:01Yeah, I have absolutely no memory
06:05of where I actually went.
06:08As in like, once I leave view of that balcony,
06:11I don't actually know how that happened.
06:13I don't know where the CGI takes over.
06:15I have no clue.
06:16I've sat with people while playing through it.
06:20There's nothing like watching your loved ones
06:22choose to kill you.
06:23That's a dark experience.
06:25I didn't do too well in school.
06:28Got in quite a bit of trouble.
06:29Ditched the check.
06:31They caught me, made me wash dishes,
06:33and I loved it.
06:37What about you?
06:38I kind of always had this dream
06:40of wanting to play a chef on TV
06:41and also do something about the hospitality industry
06:43and explore the incredible people,
06:46you know, that kind of,
06:47that are in the kitchen,
06:49that are in the kitchen,
06:50that are in the kitchen,
06:51that are in the kitchen,
06:51that are in the kitchen,
06:52that are in the kitchen,
06:53that are in the kitchen,
06:54that kind of define it.
06:56I was in a conversation
06:57with a really big production company at one point,
06:59and I pitched them my show
07:01about chefs trying to make it in a big city.
07:05And I heard crickets,
07:07and I was a little bit bummed.
07:08And then I'm driving around LA,
07:10and I look up one day,
07:11and I see a billboard for this massive show
07:14called The Bear with all these actors in chef coats.
07:18And I thought, okay, that show already exists.
07:21And I was like, but it better be,
07:22better be really good.
07:24And it was like the best thing.
07:25I'd watched on TV in a while.
07:26I asked to meet Chris Storer.
07:28He graciously,
07:30and then I assume a moment of madness,
07:32decided to meet with me as well.
07:34And we hit it off so well.
07:36And I begged him for a role in The Bear,
07:38and he was kind enough to bless me
07:40with the part of Luca.
07:41And it kind of changed my life, man.
07:43It was like a really, really special part of my life now.
07:47And then I started at this really great place as a commie.
07:51And this other chef started the same day as me.
07:55And I thought we were competition,
07:59but really we weren't.
08:01He was better than me,
08:02much, much better than me.
08:03It's kind of been alluded to,
08:05and I think it's kind of like relatively safe to confirm
08:08that he's obviously sort of referring to commie there,
08:11this idea that you have a kind of colleague
08:15that is initially maybe seen as like a form of competition.
08:19And then you kind of also realize
08:21like you're on your own path
08:23and it's not necessarily even that helpful
08:25to always see it as competition.
08:27Like it's great to have someone bring the best out of you
08:29and push you,
08:30but also accept the fact that you're on like a different path
08:32and you have to kind of pursue your own
08:36sort of individual journey.
08:38So how long you been a cook?
08:40About a year and a half.
08:41You?
08:4414 years now.
08:46Oh, so you started when you was three?
08:49Yeah, so I was really lucky,
08:50like kind of key to developing that backstory
08:54was with Courtney Storer as well.
08:57So Courtney, who's a producer on the show,
09:00she kind of handled everything that pertains to the food.
09:03A lot of what you see in the bear
09:04is based on her real experiences of working in kitchens
09:07and being in the hospitality industry
09:09for as many years as she has.
09:11Then the tattoos came about
09:13through working with my friend, Benny Shields,
09:15who's an amazing tattoo artist in LA.
09:17He did all of Jeremy's tattoos
09:19and I got to kind of just bring to him
09:21some sort of childhood memories.
09:23A lot of them are rooted in food experiences anyway
09:25that I felt could relate to Luca's experience.
09:28And it was cool to have things that were personal to me
09:30and simultaneously personal to Luca.
09:32So like I had a Tabasco bottle on my arm,
09:36that's because my brother's a huge Tabasco fan.
09:38So it was kind of for him.
09:39And I can remember as a young kid
09:42seeing my brother put hot sauce on his food
09:43and I just wanted to be like him.
09:46So I would do that.
09:48My little sister's initials are CAP.
09:51So I had a cap on my arm, like a baseball cap.
09:54My older sister's a nurse, Jo.
09:55So I had a nurse tattoo for her.
09:57And then all of these things
09:59could apply to Luca's existence as well as my own.
10:01So they felt really personal
10:03and helped me feel like I could embody the character.
10:13Is it a bird?
10:15Is it a plane?
10:16No, it's a lanky British actor.
10:18They painted gold.
10:19I think it was like three hours, but in and out, I think.
10:23I think it was like, I think we got it down
10:25to about an hour and a half for the makeup
10:28and then like half an hour for the hair, I wanna say.
10:30The team are unbelievable.
10:31Stunt people are continually like underappreciated
10:35and overlooked.
10:36They are some of the most like multi-hyphenated talents
10:39you could come across.
10:40Our stunt coordinator, Heidi Moneymaker,
10:42she is like so amazing, was incredibly patient with me.
10:47And the gentleman who doubled me, Ben,
10:49I struggle with choreography quite a lot,
10:52but they were super patient.
10:53And it was a fun process getting to learn that.
10:58And like the fight with Drax was especially cool.
11:02You know, I grew up watching Dave as a wrestler
11:05and I've been such a fan
11:06of what he has since done as an actor.
11:08He's a brilliant actor
11:10and also the sweetest human being.
11:13Like you couldn't ask for a nicer guy
11:15to beat the crap out of you.
11:17I also fully accidentally punched Dave in the face
11:20and he was too nice to say anything.
11:23And he was sort of like turned away from me
11:24and he was like, no, no, you're good, you're good,
11:25you're good, you're good.
11:26And he like walks off and like got his makeup touched up.
11:28He accidentally turned to show the side of the face
11:32that I suspected I might've punched him on.
11:35It was gold.
11:36There was gold knuckle prints on his face.
11:39So I knew he was being too nice to tell me,
11:43you punched me in the face, you idiot.
11:51Good job.
11:54Danke.
11:58This is post the discovery of the unicorn,
12:01Paul and Jenna as the leads of the film.
12:05They have struck this unicorn with their vehicle.
12:08They kind of try to hide it,
12:11sort of deny kind of what it is in the first instance.
12:13The Leopold family that I belong to have discovered this
12:17and they've sort of taken the unicorn in their own hands
12:20and into their own designs,
12:21which are pretty self-serving and malevolent.
12:25General Taker's character is wanting to be responsible
12:28and has warned people against their plans.
12:31My character is just such an idiot
12:33that he's basically either just trying to do
12:38exactly what he's told by his very malevolent parents
12:41or just find out how he can benefit from it himself
12:46in some way.
12:48And he's sort of pretending like
12:50he's got more than 12 brain cells in this scene.
12:54Paul makes this hilarious noise here
12:56that is just, it's so subtle, but it's great.
12:58I can see why you've done so well at the firm.
13:01Huh?
13:03Huh?
13:07I'm such a comedy nerd and, you know,
13:09I grew up watching so many of Paul's films
13:12and quoting them, whether it's Anchorman
13:14or whether it's Role Models,
13:16whether it's his work in Friends.
13:17You know what, Paul taught me how to like
13:19have fun with it more.
13:20I used to find comedy so torturous
13:22and comedy was psychologically like the hardest thing
13:24to do in a way.
13:25I would like purge myself of all my positive energy
13:28when doing comedy and then I'd go home
13:29and feel kind of depressed.
13:31But between Alex Sharfman, our amazing writer-director
13:35and Death of the Unicorn was his debut,
13:37which is a wild thought.
13:38Like between him and Paul,
13:40they really set this amazing tone on set
13:41of like fun and play.
13:43And that was just the best environment
13:45to do something like this in.
13:46And I fell back in love with comedy because of that.
13:49Griff!
13:51Get Elliot a suit!
13:52Oh, no, no, no, really.
13:53It's okay.
13:55Are you sure?
13:56Yeah, yeah.
13:57He doesn't mind.
13:58No, no, I'm okay.
13:58Griff!
13:59Forget it!
14:01Poor Griff, man.
14:01Played by Anthony Carrigan,
14:03who is just so funny in this movie.
14:05I loved the dynamic that developed between us
14:07where like I'm just objectively awful to him
14:10and he's so long-suffering
14:12and Griff is like a favorite character of this movie.
14:15People like love him and for good reason.
14:17Anthony's so funny, so talented and such a good dude.
14:21Think it must be a moose mating season or something.
14:25I was about done anyhow.
14:26Pass me that rope.
14:27To me, like, Shepard's like kind of closer
14:30to that sort of like relatively like neutral American accent
14:34if I can say that.
14:36So there wasn't too much vocal work, truthfully,
14:38with Shepard.
14:40Accent work for The Revenant was tricky
14:41because there's no reference, right,
14:42given the time period.
14:44That one was harder.
14:45The bear was easier, you know,
14:46because it's the closest I've gone to my own accent.
14:49It's maybe slightly different.
14:51In my mind, like, Luke grew up in North London
14:54and that was also an excuse
14:55to make him an Arsenal fan as well, because I am.
14:56But yeah, like, accents really helped me feel
14:59less like myself and more like the characters.
15:01And I kind of, I see them as like a, you know,
15:04an additional piece of costume
15:05that I'm putting on every day, you know?
15:13Just working in the garden.
15:20Well, you know, I take it back even further
15:22to the time in which, like,
15:24I first received the script for Midsommar.
15:27And I remember reading it and thinking, like,
15:29I don't know if there's anyone who can pull this off.
15:30I haven't seen, like, a filmmaker in recent times
15:33who could execute this.
15:35It seems so bonkers and so ambitious
15:39and so unique and so challenging.
15:41Like, who can do this?
15:42Then I saw Hereditary and I was like,
15:43oh, Ari Aster, the guy who wrote it
15:45and made that one, couldn't make this one.
15:47And sure enough, you know, like, Ari is unbelievable,
15:51singular as a filmmaker.
15:53He made a really, really unique film once again with this.
15:58And watching it, it's really disturbing
16:03and it kind of gets in your bones.
16:04And I think, like, the best horrors do.
16:07Midsommar did it while also being, like,
16:08I think visually really exciting and funny at times too.
16:12And, you know, I'm a bit embarrassed
16:14about talking about Midsommar
16:15only because it's chock full of all these, like,
16:16amazing complex performances.
16:18And I'm kind of like an idiot in the film.
16:22But I had so much fun.
16:24And, you know, for me, the experience wasn't
16:27all that trying, it was just a really good time
16:29because I'm sort of wandering around
16:31in a state of, like, obliviousness as Mark,
16:35whereas other people are having to sort of
16:38allow the disturbia to kind of wash over them a bit.
16:42Whereas Mark is kind of like
16:44not emotionally intelligent enough
16:46to realize what's going on.
16:47And that, I think, immunized me
16:49against getting actually scared.
16:50No, no, no, no, no, no, no!
16:52What are you doing?
16:53Get out of there!
16:54What the hell are you doing?
16:56You fucking idiot!
16:56Get out of there!
16:57Hey, what?
16:58Get your ugly fucking dick out of there!
17:00What? Okay, relax.
17:01Get out of there now!
17:02What did I do?
17:02Our ancestors are lying there!
17:04You're pissing on my ancestors!
17:07You little American fucker.
17:08I do not know how he does it.
17:11But his combination of things that are, like,
17:13you know, visually as unique and as complex
17:16as his sort of cinematography
17:19tends to be, his framing,
17:21the exactitude with which he directs is unbelievable.
17:24Ari's the only director I've worked with
17:26who talks about moving in hairs.
17:29He's like a hair to your left,
17:31oh no, like a hair back to your right
17:34and then back on that same point by a hair.
17:37Like, he's very, very specific.
17:39But it kind of makes sense when you see the framing, right?
17:42And the camera work.
17:43And Pavel, our DOP,
17:45who I actually bumped into the other day,
17:47is a genius.
17:49And what he's able to achieve in this movie,
17:51you know, is incredible.
17:53Also, and I'm just looking
17:54because of the, like, jeans tucked into the socks,
17:57that was actually an Ari asterism.
18:00Ari's fears around working in this environment
18:03was, like, tics,
18:04for the possibility of getting Lyme disease,
18:06which is obviously a very real thing.
18:08He thought, like, it would be funny
18:10if Mark kind of had some of those neuroses himself,
18:13hence the jeans tucked into the socks.
18:18All right, all OPs are under attack.
18:21This is what we're gonna do.
18:21We're gonna collapse to the first deck,
18:23Cassavack Elliot.
18:24Break it down.
18:25Let's get ready to move.
18:26This is Warfare,
18:27which is co-directed by Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza.
18:31Ray Mendoza's a former Navy SEAL
18:33who survived this event.
18:35And, you know, the objective of the film
18:38was to try and tell this story as a literal retelling
18:42with kind of no fictionalization,
18:44or dramatization whatsoever.
18:46It's based on the memories of the people
18:48that were being there.
18:49So a combination of the Iraqi family
18:51and the soldiers in this building that you see us in,
18:54which the majority of the film takes place in.
18:57And the sort of goal for, I think, Ray and Alex
19:00was to tell a story that wasn't punctuated
19:03by Hollywood grammar at all.
19:05And what I mean by that is no kind of fictitious elements.
19:09It was supposed to be like a brief story
19:13It was supposed to be like a very kind of
19:16literal recreation of the events
19:19based on memory and based on the facts.
19:22And effectively what the movie does
19:25is kind of explore like the loss on that day
19:29for everyone involved and the consequences of war,
19:32which are never positive.
19:34And this is at the point at which we first contacted
19:38by some people in the street
19:41and a grenade has just been thrown into our position.
19:45And then we come under fire.
19:47Ray having been there and also accessed to
19:51and contact with so many other people
19:52who were there that day and experienced it.
19:55It was really kind of a unique opportunity
19:57to recreate something based on the facts of the matter.
20:01It meant that the acting challenge was sort of different
20:03and it wasn't so much like regular acting,
20:07which was more immersive for us.
20:08So basic underwater demolition seal training,
20:11otherwise known as BUDS
20:12and lots of things in the military are like an acronym
20:15is considered kind of one of the hardest
20:16sort of training programs you can go through.
20:18And so naturally as actors,
20:20we were never gonna be able to do that.
20:23The attrition rate is like upper 80%.
20:26And then even the guys who try out
20:29are already some of the like fittest people on earth.
20:33So the men and women who operate at this level
20:38are far superior to any of us as it is.
20:42So we had to do a very kind of like watered down
20:45condensed version of the training
20:47to simulate it as accurately as possible.
20:50And we did like a four week bootcamp.
20:53And thereafter we kind of operated as much as possible
20:56like a military unit.
20:58Two, this is one.
20:59We've had grenades thrown into our position.
21:02Copy, one word, contact you.
21:03Elliot is injured.
21:04Are you coming to you or are you coming to us?
21:06With this film, there's like very little dialogue
21:08that isn't technical or kind of
21:13from the sort of military handbook, if you like.
21:16There's very little characterization
21:19other than what you can kind of glean
21:21from watching them sort of respond
21:23to the protocol of the environment they're in.
21:26There's no like glorification or romanticization
21:29of what they're doing.
21:30Like it's a pretty shit situation for everyone involved.
21:34And that's really kind of the point I think it's making.
21:39This was more about kind of literal depiction
21:42as opposed to promotion of any one thing.
21:46And I think there was an argument that like
21:48within the Canon of War films like that
21:50needed to sort of exist.
21:58Thank you very much for watching.