Adam Driver may have been crushing the Rebellion during his time in the Star Wars universe, but as the lead actor in Megalopolis, he’s helping Francis Ford Coppola rebel against the Hollywood industrial system. Driver joins a star-studded cast of “canceled” actors for Coppola’s latest movie, including Giancarlo Esposito, Aubrey Plaza, Nathalie Emmanuel, Shia LaBeouf, and more. While the actor has worked on several major studio blockbusters, he recently admitted that his time working on Megalopolis was his favorite, because there was no corporate control.
Speaking with Discussing Film, Adam Driver explained why he loved working on Coppola’s self-funded Megalopolis so much. The actor said that, because Coppola funded the project with his own capital, there were no producers attempting to push the movie in a direction that a major studio wanted, unlike his time working on Star Wars. He explained:
“Because [Francis Ford Coppola] was paying for it, there is just immediacy and you didn’t have to worry about people making decisions – this is not unique to Star Wars – this is, kind of, bigger budget movies where a lot of money is at stake. There was no producers in the way. There was no, somebody standing over a shoulder trying to nudge him in a direction where they thought that the movie should be. It was a direct conversation that you were having with Francis.”
Driver went on to describe Megalopolis as “one of the best shooting experiences I ever had.” It is unbelievably rare to see a $100 million-plus movie made with no corporate oversight, as very few filmmakers have the means or the willingness to front such capital for a single movie. But, in doing so, Adam Driver said that Coppola and the movie’s cast and crew shared a cathartic feeling of rebellion. He explained:
“It felt like we were rebelling against something. And I feel like you can feel it in the film. I don’t have a lot of references that I can place where Megalopolis is like this other film. To make something that’s singular [is] incredibly hard to do at that scale, that I don’t know will be done again.”
Megalopolis Is Heading For Box Office Disappointment
As insane a gamble as it was for Francis Ford Coppola to entirely self-fund Megalopolis‘ production, unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to have paid off. Megalopolis hit theaters last week, and its opening weekend figures fell short of the movie’s already disappointing predictions: Megalopolis opened to an abysmal $4 million.
While almost everyone reading this can only dream of having $4 million (ourselves included), for a Hollywood blockbuster, that amount will just about cover the catering budget. It is unlikely that Megalopolis will fare any better in the weeks to come, considering the dicey online reception to the movie. However, the project could find redemption when it eventually hits home video in the near future.
Megalopolis
is currently screening in theaters.