Why doesn't Brando like Oz?

Perhaps Brando is not a Muppets or Star Wars fan. To answer your question I don't know but I read that Brando's nickname for Oz is "Miss Piggy".

[deleted]

maybe Brando has a fear of Mrs. Piggy or Yoda or maybe Oz is just a freak.

Oz had the temerity to try and direct "The Great One" (Gosh, imagine that, he was the 'director'... !), and apparently Brando took exception to this; making him, in my estimation, an ass. Hence the thread in relation I've posted on this very board. Come and join me if you have anything (be it contrary or in support) to add.



Flash, I love you, but we only have fourteen hours to save the Earth!

I don't know the particulars of the Brando/Oz rift, or even it really exists. If it does, I'm tempted to think its because Brando is famous for being what nice people like to call "difficult".

Case in point:

On his commentary track to Apocalypse Now, Francis Coppola describes, in glowing terms, problems he encountered with Brando on the set of that film.

He had been instructed to have read the script, plus Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", the novel upon which the script was based. He had agreed to lose the substantial girth he had accumulated over the previous two years, to more adequately play the part of a US Army colonel.

Brando arrived, with no script, and not having read the novel. He was still grossly overweight. He holed up in his trailer, refusing to come out, sensitive about being filmed with his appearance as it was. He eventually came out to 'rehearse', but refused to work directly with Martin Sheen in any of these instances, in order to more methodically act as if his character and Sheen's were meeting for the first time.

During these 'rehearsals', he improvised vast amounts of dialogue, most of it only tenuously connected to his character, or the film. A portion of this, Brando reciting T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men", is included in the extras on the Apocalypse Now Complete Dossier DVD.

Granted, Coppola had decided that the ending as scripted by John Milius was not going to work with the direction the film's mood was taking, but he felt that Brando's lack of preparation was hampering any hope of giving shape to an ending that would work.

Coppola eventually appeased Brando's unwillingness to be shot as obese as he was, by saying that he would only photograph him seated, partially obscured, or in shadows. This would end up giving Brando his phantom-like presence in the film.

The problem would be trying to get a meaningful performance from Brando, who still had not yet read either the script or the book, in the remaining few days he would be available.

The next day, Brando emerged from his trailer, head shaven, and in good spirits. He revealed that he had read all of "Heart of Darkness" the night before and had an understanding of what he needed to do. He still had not read the script, and insisted note cards with his lines on them be concealed around the set, so he could read his lines as he was being shot, in order to capture the sponteneity of someone saying the words for the first time.

An ending was fashioned from Brando's 'rehearsal' ramblings, and from the two days of unrehearsed shooting done with Martin Sheen.

For this he was paid a reported $10 million.



Matt Channing
Oscar quality film music at bargain basement prices.