Method acting gets a bad rap, because it often seems annoying and pretentious, but at least the way Christian Bale does it—losing a lot of weight, gaining a lot of weight, occasionally screaming at a cinematographer on the set of Terminator Salvation for disrupting his work—is less aggravating than the “I’m going to act like an asshole because I’m playing an asshole” shit that certain Jared Letos do (not that we’re naming any specific Jared Letos). Case in point, the latest example of Bale being very serious about acting is actually a little fun: He told IndieWire that he had to stop talking to Chris Rock on the set of David O. Russell’s Amsterdam because Rock is just too funny.
Bale said that Russell made a point to introduce him to Rock and get Rock to tell “some stories” that he knew would really make Bale laugh, so he said he “was loving it” when the first started working together. Eventually, though, Bale realized that Rock is “so bloody funny” that he couldn’t act around him and that it would just be “Christian laughing at Chris Rock” instead of whatever Amsterdam stuff he was supposed to be doing. So Bale said he had to go to Rock and say, “mate, I love talking to you, and we have mutual friends, but I can’t do it anymore.” He said that Russell didn’t cast him in the movie to watch him “giggle,” adding, “He wants me to be Burt, and I’m forgetting how to be Burt.”
Bale also explained that he tries to “isolate” himself on set, because if he gets to know the “incredible people” he works with too well, he won’t be able to believe what he’s doing in the scene. This all may seem like a bummer for Rock, but at least we know that Christian Bale saying something akin to “we can’t be friends because you’re too funny” isn’t the worst thing that a famous person has done to him lately.
