Dev Patel details “absolute catastrophe” of filming directorial debut ‘Monkey Man’

nme.com:

Monkey Man.The British actor’s new film premiered to a strong reaction at SXSW last month, but he has since spoken about how difficult it was to get the film made.During a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) ahead of the film’s cinema release this week (April 5), the actor said that directing, producing and acting in the film was “the most demanding thing I’ve ever done in my life”, per Variety.He added that “everyday we faced absolute catastrophe” throughout the process.“I begged our financier not to shut us down a few weeks before principal photography,” he said. “We were meant to shoot in India then COVID hit.

I lost my initial production designer and [cinematographer] and the film was basically dead, then we pivoted and went to a tiny island in Indonesia where we could create a bubble in an empty hotel for the whole crew of nearly 500 people.

It was a grueling nine months of absolute joy and utter chaos.”“All of the locations we prepped for months at – we lost day of – so we had to adapt last minute,” he continued.“The borders closed also, so I couldn’t bring in lots of supporting characters.