MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Director George Miller Recalls Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy Conflict

It’s no secret that Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron did not get along while shooting Mad Max: Fury Road. The two had major issues with each other and several years ago they opened up about their conflict.

Now, director George Miller is talking about the feud between the stars during the film’s production, which all stemmed from Hardy being a difficult actor to work with.

During an interview with The Telegraph, Miller recalled: “They were just two very different performers. Tom has a damage to him but also a brilliance that comes with it, and whatever was going on with him at the time, he had to be coaxed out of his trailer.

He added: “Whereas Charlize was incredibly disciplined – a dancer by training, which told in the precision of her performance – and always the first one on set.”

Miller did point out that things on the set gradually got better as time went on, saying: “I’m an optimist, so I saw their behavior as mirroring their characters, where they had to learn to cooperate in order to ensure mutual survival.“

But, he said: “There’s no excuse for it, and I think there’s a tendency in this business to use great performances as an excuse for other disruption that could be avoided.”

Before Miller started shooting Furiosa, he talked to his stars Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth to ensure a smooth production.

He explained: “You have to be obsessive about safety – physical safety, as the shoot goes on and fatigue sets in, but also psychological safety. It’s not like the wild old days.”

There’s a story that was told by Fury Road’s Camera operator Mark Goellnicht about a day that he remembers "vividly," in which Hardy’s reluctance to show up to work on time made Theron blow up.

Goellnicht said: “The call on set was eight o'clock. Charlize got there right at eight o'clock, sat in the War Rig, knowing that Tom's never going to be there at eight even though they made a special request for him to be there on time. He was notorious for never being on time in the morning. If the call time was in the morning, forget it — he didn't show up."

First assistant cameraman Ricky Schamburg went on to say that he was unsure whether Hardy's deliberate decision to arrive late on set, “but it felt deliberately provocative. If you ask me, he kind of knew that it was really pissing Charlize off, because she’s professional and she turns up really early.”

Hardy showed up three hours late to set that day, while Theron waited in the War Rig with full costume and makeup on.

When Hardy did finally show up, Goellnicht explained: “She jumps out of the War Rig, and she starts swearing her head off at him, saying, ‘Fine the f–king c–nt a hundred thousand dollars for every minute that he’s held up this crew,’ and ‘How disrespectful you are!' She was right. Full rant. She screams it out. It’s so loud, it’s so windy — he might’ve heard some of it, but he charged up to her and went, ‘What did you say to me?'”

Goellnicht added, “He was quite aggressive. She really felt threatened, and that was the turning point.” After the confrontation went down, Theron had producer Denise Di Novi come down to the film’s set to shadow her and ensure there would be no further conflicts.

Theron said of the experience: “It got to a place where it was kind of out of hand, and there was a sense that maybe sending a woman producer down could maybe equalize some of it, because I didn’t feel safe.

“I kind of put my foot down. George then said, ‘Okay, well, if Denise comes…’ He was open to it and that kind of made me breathe a little bit, because it felt like I would have another woman understanding what I was up against.”

Hardy had this to say about the confrontation: “In hindsight, I was in over my head in many ways. The pressure on both of us was overwhelming at times. What she needed was a better, perhaps more experienced partner in me… I’d like to think that now that I’m older and uglier, I could rise to that occasion.”

In the end, they made a great freakin’ movie, but it sucks that Hardy put the production through hell with his behavior.