So you blew up at him right there, right, cussing at him in front of everyone else?
This is not acceptable behavior in the medical profession, and hasn’t been for years. The days of the prima donna surgeon who can get away with throwing scalpels around, or screaming at colleagues, are long past. That sort of behavior is a documented factor in both declines in patient care and the nursing shortage. It opens the facility up to high staff turnover, patient complaints, and litigation exposure for work-place harassment. It is directly addressed, and prohibited, in virtually every CBA (collective bargaining agreement) of unionized healthcare staff. And it violates the AMA’s Code of Professional Ethics. Act like that these days – and refuse to reform when corrected – and you’ll lose your hospital privileges and maybe your job, and brilliance be damned.
I heard it was from August. That means whoever had the tape was sitting on it for at least 6 months before they leaked it. Make of that what you will.
Did Bale go overboard? Sure, but to me it doesn’t sound like any of the so-called threats were ever serious – just OTT posturing. From all I’ve read about this incident, the industry folks are, by and large, going “yeah, so?” The DP sounds like he’s a continual fuckup and as Bale’s notorious for being … intense, shall we say? … that meant the DP should’ve made extra careful not to make a rookie-ass mistake like moving around during a take.
In short: meh, doesn’t faze me much. Now, Gordon Ramsey would’ve had this DP for breakfast good ‘n’ proper (using a rustic, simple, British menu, of course).
Earlier than that actually; it was reported (but without audio) back in July. His altercation with his mother and sister was a few days later. Scuttlebutt is that he took the death of Heath Ledger particularly hard and that he was having marital problems.
The most unforgivable thing about the tirade to me is that it wasn’t in a vacuum or a little room with just Shane Hurlbut and McG and a couple of other people, but in front of the entire crew. You’re talking dozens of people, many of whom work for/under Shane Hurlbut. A public humiliation like this is impossible to live down among peers and those you supervise. (Suppose that the director had gone off on Bale like that for not getting a scene right and lashed into him for 4 and a half minutes in front of everybody- nobody would think that Bale was being a prima donna for walking off the set and refusing to return.)
Whoopi Goldberg’s defense of Bale on The View with “I’ve done the same thing” is one of the oddest. Uh, yeah… Whoopi did that, so it must be okay. (Now if I read Dolly Parton had done that, I’d probably say “must be okay”.)
My personal opinion is that people can find any excuse in the world to justify tantrumy behaviour that the rest of us assume we’re supposed to grow out of as children. Pilots flying planes in distress manage to find a way to control themselves under pressure-why can’t you?
Answer-because you’re an a**hole who doesn’t want to grow up so you’ll reach for any excuse to justify your poor manners (we can’t get the guy fired, my job is high pressure wahwahwah). Simple fact-at some point you will piss off the wrong person.
That sound clip sounds unremarkable to me. Acting is an emotional profession. I would guess that this kind of outburst is routine.
However, I read that Bale recently went off on his mother and sister too. Combine that with his massive bulking up for the Batman role, I suspect steroid use.
I am not “in the business” by any means, and my sole experience on a film set was spending one day as an extra when a Hollywood movie was doing some on-location scenes in my town. But during that one day I learned that hours of work can go into a scene only a few minutes long, that it is expected to be DEAD SILENT when the cameras are rolling, and that the crew and equipment may be only a foot or two away from the stars.
Bale’s reaction to the Director of Photography’s behavior was over the top, but it sounds like the DP didn’t just happen to walk by somewhere in the distance off camera. If he was adjusting the lights during the shoot, he might have been practically in Bale’s face. (Or he might not have been, but I don’t think he could have been very far away either.) And it sounds like his behavior was not only not the norm for a film set, but was contrary to Bale’s specific request that he stop messing with the lights during the shoot.
Bale has been acting in movies for more than 20 years, and if he were habitually an abusive jerk on the set then this probably wouldn’t have been the first such incident to be made public. It seems likely that this was, for whatever reason, an unusual situation for him that he didn’t deal with well. He behaved badly, but I don’t see how it really hurt the DP or anyone else. So why should this be a big deal? I’m sure it was unpleasant for the DP, but this happened over six months ago and he apparently wasn’t fired over it or anything. The two don’t have to work together long-term as they would if they shared an office, so the DP won’t need to have anything more to do with Bale if he doesn’t want to.
I’m sure one exists. The first thing I thought listening to it, was that Bale was all miked up for the scene in various ways and the DP wasn’t. They were shooting. I’m sure SOMEONE was filming that.
Wow, I can’t believe that some people actually think that Christian Bale’s career or reputation will be negatively affected by this. Bale’s been a professional actor since he was 12, and his 2nd film role was the lead in a big-budget Spielberg production. He’s widely believed to be one of the finest actors working today and will never want for work. Besides the Terminator series (you know there’s going to be more than one, though I doubt McG will be asked to do the next one) there will be more Batmans in the future. Bale is nothing if not eclectic in his choice of projects. His next high-profile role is as FBI agent Melvin Purvis in Michael Mann’s Public Enemies (the one with Johnny Depp as John Dillinger), which opens in July.
That DP, on the other hand, had better figure out another line of work or drastically drop his price and/or go back to TV work. DPs often work on 2-3 projects a year (Hilbert had 3 major motion picture projects in 2008). Principle shooting on Terminator Salvation was finished months ago, and yet according to IMDB he hasn’t done anything since, and has no upcoming projects. Without knowing anything about what’s going on behind the scenes, my guess is that he’s not actively being blackballed, but that producers and directors might figure, well, there are tons of good DPs out there, why risk millions of dollars on one who is known to upset the talent?
That remix by “revolucian” is hilarious!
If that’s the case, then actors are routinely assholes. Their choice of profession hardly licenses them to behavior any normal adult would be taken to serious task over.
Interesting. I just looked this person up and she was the Regional Chief of Surgery in my region for the last 12 years before being named one of the 100 Most Powerful Women in Canada in November 2008, so I guess she’s doing ok for herself despite her OR manners.
Or she’s not as bad as you described her to be. Or abusive doctors are still acceptable in Canada and it’s just one of those things where the U.S is vastly different.
Or she grew up and stopped throwing temper tantrums.
I’m catching up on old Hell’s Kitchen episodes with Chef Ramsay. It’s hilarious. That guy is paid to act like a temperamental dictatorial prat. Off camera, I hear he’s a big softy.
Bale apparently has it backwards.
No, no. She’s just as bad. Not only have I had med students crying to me after being in one of her surgeries, I’ve witness her psycho fits myself (although sans scalpel as this wasn’t in an OR).
I don’t think things are much different in Canada than they are in the US - I think you have a very rosey view. Come on, Gregory House is based on something. The fact of the matter is that people with exceptional gifts get away with things that other people don’t. If Christian Bale gets the butts in the seats, he’s going to be kept around even if he does act like a looney once and a while.
I do have to say that though I’m in the “he’s a dick” camp with Bale’s behavior, whether or not I go to see TERMINATOR IV would have nothing to do with it one way or the other. I haven’t seen a Terminator movie in the theater yet, though I have watched the first two on DVD, but if Bale were to appear in another movie that interested me and it was revealed he’d peed on the craft service waiters and pistol whipped the key grip in front of his kids it wouldn’t really deter me as I can usually separate art/artist. (Mel Gibson’s an antisemitic homophobic nutcase substance abusing religious fanatic and I’ve enjoyed some of his films.) I have no idea if the cast of HARRY POTTER gets along but short of a crazed German director turning HALF BLOOD PRINCE into a scheißfilm and having an actual snuff moment by killing M… uh… the actor who plays the guy who gets killed in that movie… on camera I’m going to see it.
Not likely. Film stock is expensive. They’re not going to leave the cameras rolling when no one’s acting.
You actually believe that the reason Bale went on that tirade was because he was concerned about the money? His only reason for yelling was that he felt that the DP had personally wronged him.
I have a temper myself; I’ve lost it many times for big and small reasons. But I have never, never gone on for that long and that many "fuck"s. I can totally sympathize with Bale for getting upset and losing his temper, but when he doesn’t stop after a minute or so, that’s when he becomes a complete asshole and loses all sympathy from me.
And to all those making the analogies about what you’d do if someone messed up or lost your hard work: Repeating their work is part of an actor’s job. It is a simple expectation that any actor will have to repeat any scene any number of times for any number of reasons. You can’t say that about most jobs, so the analogies fall short.
Right, my citing of the basics of employment law and the AMA Code of Ethics all springs from just a rosy view. You, OTOH, cite to House. Those playing at home will have to decide for themselves whose view is more realistic.