Oliver Stone said that the shooting Born killers It certainly had its challenges and Robert Downey Jr. certainly didn't make things any easier.
Thirty years after the release of the 1994 crime novel, the Oscar-winning director revisited the film for a recent oral history SquireAmong them, Downey's improvisation in a scene in which his character dips the front of his white shirt in fake blood and stuffs it through the zipper of his pants to simulate a bloody penis.
“Oh, come on, this is too much! You're going too far, Robert,” Stone recalled yelling at the actor for the vulgar moment. “You're ruining my movie! Get over your asshole idea. … This is not some travesty bullshit.”
However, the director later changed his mind, telling the Oppenheimer star, “Wait, wait, wait a second. Let me see that fucking thing again.” Downey obeyed orders before Stone added, “Pull it back half an inch. All right. Let's go.”
Born killers followed Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis' characters, psychopathic serial killer lovers who become media sensations during their nationwide killing spree. Downey played trashy TV journalist Wayne Gale.
The 1994 film also took place during a time when Downey was struggling with addiction. “The only time I was awake… was between Action and Cut,” he said. Iron Man the star admitted.
It wasn't just Downey, though. Stone told the outlet that the production “was a zoo in the sense that the actors were all on different journeys. I think Woody was the sanest.” And that's saying a lot, given that Harrelson is known for his marijuana use.
“I will say this, and Oliver reassured me of this: I don't want to say I was the moral center of this movie, but I was the one who took the least amount of drugs! Which is… that's never happened in my career or in my life,” Harrelson added. “And no one has ever taken more drugs than me, but in this case I was Mother Teresa.”
Aside from the craziness that ensued on set, which Downey also described as a “precisely executed three-ring circus ballet,” the actor still had high praise for what Stone created with Born killers: “With this film, Oliver Stone has something that still deserves to be re-examined.”
Downey then added: “Oliver Stone is a director who, aside from [Christopher] Nolan and maybe a few others, is the ultimate embodiment of social commentary through cinema. Oliver Stone has never made a film that didn't say something. Never.”