On the set of Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw, Dwayne Johnson tried to make Jason Statham break character every day. And while Statham might be known for playing a cool, steely Brit onscreen, even he couldn’t keep it together 100% of the time in the face of The Rock’s comedic onslaught. This wound up ruining a few takes, as the film’s producer, Hiram Garcia, recalled:
Dwayne had a specific goal in every one of their scenes. And that was to make Jason crack. There were always the lines that were scripted, that were gonna be hilarious. But then Dwayne had a specific goal every day of ‘What can I say that is just gonna mess Jason up?’ Jason’s tough, but once you get really under there and pushing Jason’s buttons, he starts cracking every time.
Dwayne Johnson is known for messing with his co-stars, like how he pranked Kevin Hart on Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, so this is par for the course for the mega-star. Hobbs and Shaw mess with each other onscreen and as Hiram Garcia told Collider, Dwayne Johnson made it his sole objective to get his co-star to break character in every scene.
The Rock had the benefit of a highly comedic script and lines that were already a challenge to get through because of how funny they were and there are definitely some moments in the film you can imagine might have required a few takes because of it. But The Rock didn’t stop there. He figured out ways to push Jason Statham’s buttons and say things that would make him crack in some way, thereby ruining takes in the process.
What’s funny about this is that you wouldn’t think Jason Statham would crack. Not that he doesn’t have a sense of humor, just that thanks to the kinds of characters he generally plays, his onscreen persona is not that of a happy go lucky guy or the kind of guy who would tolerate such frivolity. When you think of Jason Statham, you don’t think of an image of him letting out a big belly laugh.
Instead you think of someone like Shaw, who takes things very seriously and is immune to jokes and nonsense and can’t be messed with. That is clearly not the case though. Despite his general toughness that Hiram Garcia cited, Jason Statham was powerless against Dwayne Johnson’s efforts to make him break character. The action star cracked like an egg every time and with The Rock doing this every day, he got no reprieve.
In the promotion of Hobbs & Shaw, we’ve seen a lot of banter back and forth between the two co-stars, echoing their dynamic in the film itself, and this just goes to show that this wasn’t only for the press and the two have that buddy dynamic behind-the-scenes as well. With any luck, we’ll get to see some of Dwayne Johnson making Jason Statham break character on the eventual home video release of Hobbs & Shaw.
Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw is now playing. Check out our 2019 Release Schedule to keep track of all everything headed to theaters this year and stay tuned to CinemaBlend for the latest movie news.
