Among the many superlatives that can be attributed to it, Avengers: Infinity War was a massive ensemble film like no other, bringing together (almost) all the actors from the Marvel Cinematic Universe for one giant event. Given the lengthy cast list and the character-filled frames of the film, you would think that shooting the movie was a fun and busy communal experience among the many co-stars. However, while it might have been that way for some actors on Infinity War, for Carrie Coon, it was quite different. The actress, who played Black Order member Proxima Midnight, found filming Infinity War to be a lonely experience, as she explained:
The Avengers franchise is so enormous, it's actually much lonelier, because you're never acting with the actors in the room. Robert Downey Jr.'s come in six weeks ago and done this scene and now you're coming in and putting yourself into it and he's not there.
It is interesting to think that such a jam-packed movie could be a lonely shooting experience for anyone but I think that what Carrie Coon told Entertainment Weekly speaks to the nature of modern filmmaking, especially on a blockbuster. With so many moving parts and so many busy, in-demand actors, sometimes it's not logistically feasible to have everybody in the same place at the same time. Thanks to movie magic, it's not always even necessary. Carrie Coon only shot her motion-capture scenes for six hours in Atlanta before flying to San Francisco to get her face scanned at ILM. That was it. That was the extent of her experience shooting Infinity War. So you can see how that could be a lonely, somewhat impersonal experience, just breezing in and not getting to act opposite anyone.
Because she played a motion-capture character, Carrie Coon's experience was probably not representative of all of her co-stars. For the actors that appeared onscreen in their human forms and weren't motion-capture, there was undoubtedly more actual interaction on set, equaling what was hopefully a less lonely experience. But Proxima Midnight was created with CGI in post, so ultimately it wasn't necessary for Carrie Coon to film with the actors she would be sharing screentime with.
We've often heard how awkward and weird it can be to film these CGI-heavy blockbusters where an actor is required to act with nothing in front of them except maybe a ball on a stick, but the loneliness aspect is something you don't hear about as much. It definitely makes sense and is just one of the many challenges that come with shooting these types of films where there is less and less tethering an actor to the tangibility of the real world. Whatever loneliness she felt, it didn't effect Carrie Coon's performance, as Proxima Midnight was one of the more menacing members of the Black Order, even if she ultimately didn't have much screen time.
You can next catch Carrie Coon, sans CGI, opposite Mackenzie Davis in the indie flick Izzy Gets the F*ck Across Town, in theaters on June 22nd. She will also be appearing later this summer in season 2 of the USA show The Sinner. To see all of the biggest movies hitting theaters this year, check out our release schedule.
