Tom Hardy Allegedly Spat at Armie Hammer During ‘Mad Max’ Audition, Then Won the Role
variety.comZack Sharf The rollercoaster journey of casting the title role in George Miller’s “Mad Max: Fury Road” is documented in Kyle Buchanan’s upcoming oral history book “Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road.” An excerpt published by Vulture reveals that casting Max Rockatansky boiled down to Tom Hardy, Armie Hammer and Jeremy Renner after an exhaustive search that also included Michael Fassbender, Joel Kinnaman, Heath Ledger, Eric Bana and more.Buchanan, who is also the awards season columnist for the New York Times, reports: “Near the end of the process, Hardy emerged as a front-runner alongside Jeremy Renner and Armie Hammer.
Hardy and Hammer even read together as part of their audition, and when Hardy gnashed his teeth and spat at his scene partner, Hammer told Miller that Hardy needed to be Max more than he did.” Audition cameraman Todd Matthew Grossman told Buchanan, “Jeremy and Armie were equally wonderful, but there was something about Tom in the room where it felt like that was Max, without a doubt.
He had that kind of suppressed emotional dryness that you’d find in a post-apocalypse and, buried underneath it, disdain for the world.
There was this intensity that burned through the lens.”Miller added, “I had the same feeling about Tom that I had when [original ‘Mad Max’ star] Mel Gibson first walked into the room: There was a kind of edgy charm, the charisma of animals.
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