Joel Schumacher Says Val Kilmer Was 'Psychotic' and Tommy Lee Jones Was Not Kind to Jim Carrey on The Set of BATMAN FOREVER

Director Joel Schumacher has been around for quite some time and has made so many movies that I bet you didn’t even realize. He was behind the lens for some total cult classics like St. Elmo’s Fire, The Lost Boys (one of my favorites), and Flatliners. He made powerful films like Falling Down, A Time to Kill, and The Client. And he made the beautiful film adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera. He also has some less popular films on his credits, and one of them was the film Batman Forever. Fans are sort of divided on this one. I don’t think anyone thinks it was a great movie, but I know some people think it was fun, and just don’t hold it to a very high standard. We hadn’t really had a taste yet of what a wildly popular, huge budget, worldwide hit of a superhero film was yet. But in a recent in depth interview with Vulture, Schumacher talked about the making of the film, he said, “making movies is not all blow jobs and sunglasses.” His words, not mine.

Anyway, in the interview, Schumacher is told that he is known for his high praise of the actors he has worked with, while very infrequently saying negative things in the press. He responded by saying:

“No, I said Tommy Lee Jones was an asshole in People magazine.”

But when asked why he worked with him twice, he said:

He was fabulous on The Client. But he was not kind to Jim Carrey when we were making Batman Forever. And I didn’t say Val [Kilmer] was difficult to work with on Batman Forever. I said he was psychotic.

He then elaborated on Jones’ attitude toward Carrey:

Tommy is, and I say this with great respect, a scene stealer. Well, you can’t steal the scene from Jim Carrey. It’s impossible. And, I think it irked Tommy.

He was then asked if Jones tried to steal the scenes from Carrey, and said:

No, he wasn’t kind to Jim. He did not act towards Jim the way an Oscar winner with a star on Hollywood Boulevard, being the oldest member of the cast, and having such a distinguished career and the accolades to go with it, should have acted towards Jim. But what happens on the set stays on the set.

When pressed about why Val Kilmer was psychotic, Schumacher said to check out the Entertainment Weekly article about it. So Vulture added a footnote stating that the article he referenced said that “Kilmer insisted the crew address him as ‘Mr. Kilmer,’ would arrive to set late and covered in blankets, stubbed a cigarette out on the face of a cameraman, and muttered his lines to quietly they could not be heard.” Yikes, dude! That sounds like a terrible experience. No wonder he doesn’t have great things to say about it. He did go on to say he believed that Kilmer was the best Batman though. So that really counts for something considering the circumstances.

Had you heard about any of that drama before?