10 Movie Scenes From 2017 That Upset These Actors

Life

There are roles, and then there are roles. There are good roles that kick-started famous careers, and oppositely, they are roles so bad that they effectively ended the careers of many stars and starlets. You remember some actors only for the memorable characters they played and despise others for depicting what the rotten core of humanity really looks like. Some roles get the actors who played them accolades and awards and a paycheck hike like none other. And still, other roles are so traumatic, for various reasons that they leave their actors with a serious case of the heebie-jeebies.

Think Tippy Hedren in Birds where she was filmed with actual crows making a go for her head (according to her, because she wouldn’t hook up with the director, the famous Alfred Hitchcock). There was also Maria Schneider’s shock and humiliation when the infamous “butter” scene took place in Last Tango in Paris without her having been informed beforehand.

You might contest that these scenes were traumatic because the actors were manipulated by the directors, and we agree. But even Tom Hanks chose to starve himself and remain in isolation for filming The Castaway and even Philadelphia before that. And can we mention Christian Bale in The Machinist or even Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight? So while 2017 did not bring anything so drastic for the actors, here are 15 movies and movie scenes of 2017 that must have traumatized the actors enacting them.

10. Idris Elba In 100 Streets

100 Streets is widely believed to be an averGE movie because we have all seen Idris Elba do better, and we don’t just mean his spine-chilling voiceover of Shere Khan in The Jungle Book. But what might persuade Elba’s fans into watching this movie is that it features Elba’s second ever revealing scene in a film, as he shares a scene with on-screen wife Gemma Arterton. The first one was when he and Kate Winslet shot a rather aggressive scene in the 2017 flick, The Mountain Between Us, which he called “a frightening mix of nerves and total aggression.” Was he okay with the vulnerability of the scene? He said, “These scenes though are definitely challenging, Gemma is a pro and [director] Jim O’Hanlon gave us a skeleton set, so it just made it a lot easier to do. But it’s always difficult to do.” Do it for the fans, Elba!

9. Sebastian Stan In I, Tonya

Anybody who has ever followed figure skating has to remember the infamous case of Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan – where the former staged an attack on the latter to take out the competition, so to speak. The movie features Margot Robbie as Tonya Harding and Sebastian Stan as Jeff Gillooly, Harding’s ex. Sebastian, however, was scared as hell of his role. Why? He said, “I’ve never been ice skating, ever. I’m traumatized by the idea of it. Look, see those kids out there, falling. I keep thinking that I’m going to fall, and then someone is going to come by and cut my wrists off with one of their blades. So I’m much happier on the sidelines, as a spectator.” Frankly, after the very visual depiction, we kind of agree with him. So why did Stan take on the role of Gillooly? Replied Stan, “I, Tonya has an incredible script. As an actor, my job is to ‘tell the story.’ So I did.”