This month marked the tenth anniversary of Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher's The Social Network and, yes, we’re still swooning over the viral recreation Dylan O’Brien and Sarah Ramos did earlier this year. The pair blew the internet’s collective mind with an at-home tribute to a memorable scene between Andrew Garfield, Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake.
The Maze Runner and Teen Wolf star embodied Garfield’s role of Eduardo Saverin, one of the co-founders of Facebook, right down to the tear at the edge of his eye. Now, O’Brien has opened up about the 87-second video with these words:
So Sarah [Ramos] is a really good friend of mine. She’s one of my best friends, and when she started doing these quaranscenes at the beginning of the pandemic, we talked about doing one together. She sent me a bunch of things at one point, and just naturally, the thing that stuck out to me the most was that Andrew Garfield scene from The Social Network. It’s just so iconic. We were on Facetime when she sent that to me, and I just started doing it. I already kind of knew it, and she was like, ‘Okay, that’s the one. We should do that.’
If you have yet to see Dylan O’Brien take on The Social Network, or just need a refresher, take a look at the “quaranscene” side by side with the actual 2010 moment:
Oscar worthy, am I right? Dylan O’Brien went all out to play Eduardo Saverin, and it really shows through the clip. O’Brien told The Hollywood Reporter that he and Sarah Ramos became very invested in doing right by the scene. He filmed 13 takes of his part, and Sarah Ramos decided to choose the take where he got the most invested in the scene. O’Brien explained further:
Sarah is so particular about getting it exactly right and honoring it to a T, which I’m really weird about too. So, on that one take with the tears, I thought I went too far and I was surprised that she used it. When she sent me the cut, I was like,’Oh, you used the tears take.’ And she was like, ‘I’m not going to not use that.’ (Laughs.) And then, the conversation ended there. Sarah’s really funny like that. She’s a very specific filmmaker, and when she has an idea, she sticks to it, which I completely respect. Yeah, I definitely got into it. (Laughs.) I think it was just fun to do after not doing much for a little while.
The response was over two million views that even reached Andrew Garfield himself. The actor does not use social media, but he texted his Tick, Tick… Boom collaborator, Lin-Manuel Miranda ,to publicly reach out to Dylan O’Brien about the performance. Check out what happened:
This might be one of the most iconic movie “moments” of 2020. It’s interesting to hear how the scene came together between the friends and we’re not surprised they worked so hard on it, considering how perfect it turned out. It’s definitely an achievement that Dylan O’Brien could film such an emotional sequence in his home without anyone to share the scene with but a camera.
David Fincher is famous for going with something like 60 takes with his actors, so 13 is just about right for recreating the short sequence. No word if the other cast and filmmakers involved saw the video. However, Dylan O’Brien’s new movie Love and Monsters, which is about romance in the face of the monster apocalypse, has dropped on PVOD on the same day as Aaron Sorkin’s new film, Netflix’s The Trial of the Chicago 7. Both are available to stream now.
