One of Hollywood’s most famous actors, Gary Oldman, has built a critically acclaimed career by portraying iconic figures. From winning an Academy Award for the role of Winston Churchill in ‘Darkest Hour‘ to his legendary 1990s performances in such films as ‘The Fifth Element‘ and ‘Air Force One,’ Oldman never disappoints his fans. However, director Christopher Nolan has decided to give this eccentric actor one more opportunity to play one of his best roles—that of Jim Gordon, the uncompromising conscience of Gotham City, in his ‘Batman‘ trilogy.
Whereas this role has firmly established Oldman’s reputation in blockbuster films, the actor has also faced enormous psychological stress caused by the extreme anti-spoiling culture of Hollywood. Being on set during the shooting of the huge 2012 Batman movie, ‘The Dark Knight Rises,’ the actor experienced a shocking twenty-minute panic attack that nearly cost him his life.
Gary Oldman Faces Intense Pressure To Protect Big Movie Spoilers
After the unprecedented commercial and critical success of ‘The Dark Knight,’ excitement about the final installment of the trilogy has reached unprecedented levels among comic book fans.
Director Christopher Nolan is famously secretive. In fact, he rarely allows even his closest collaborators to know the full story. Consequently, his production team heavily watermarked and monitored every screenplay distributed to the cast. Oldman’s role became crucial to the plot, so the actor’s script included many twists that could ruin the entire blockbuster.
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Under enormous pressure to keep the secret of the movie’s climactic finale, a minor mistake turned into a real nightmare for the experienced actor.
That terrifying experience began in a hotel room when the actor suddenly realized that he could not find the extremely confidential document.
A Full-Blown Panic And The True Identity Of ‘Batman’
During 20 extremely stressful minutes, he tried to find the screenplay, knowing that even a small leak could destroy the film’s marketing strategies. The actor later confessed that he was scared to death about what consequences his negligence might bring.
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“I was in a panic for 20 minutes,” Oldman told the BBC. “I thought, ‘Where the h— have I put it?’ It had my name on it, they would have killed me,” he added. “I’d gone out for dinner,” the actor explained, “and I had put it in the room between the mattress and the bed, because I couldn’t scrunch it into the safe. I was half-thinking about something else and shoved it there.”
Luckily for him, the screenplay was found exactly where he had forgotten it, and no spoilers have been revealed. ‘The Dark Knight Rises‘ delivered an excellent ending to the trilogy, including a very emotional scene in which Gordon discovers Batman’s true identity.
Although the high expectations of the time have disappointed some viewers, the movie has stood the test of time perfectly. In the current film market, in which almost every superhero franchise undoes the ending of their films to bring back dead characters, ‘The Dark Knight Rises‘ remains the only recent blockbuster with absolute confidence to conclude the story forever.
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