Thanks to the sexual misconduct allegations that removed original cast member Chris D’Elia from Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead, a replacement was in order, and at the last minute. Racing to the rescue of the Netflix original, actor Tig Notaro was whisked into the picture thanks to some eleventh hour reshoots and a lot of CGI magic. But even though she didn’t work with the majority of the Army of the Dead cast, Notaro did get to shoot footage with one of the film’s other actors, working with Ana de la Reguera for two crucial scenes.
As she revealed in a recent interview with Insider, Ana de la Reguera was able to shoot with Tig Notaro on a couple of Army of the Dead moments that needed both actors on hand. As such, Reguera returned to set for some finishing touches, as there were elements that exceeded the reach of even the best CGI technology. Explaining those moments, and why they were the exception to Zack Snyder’s approach, Reguera said:
The scene where I drop off the gas canisters on the roof. I shot that originally with Chris so we had to reshoot that. And the scene where the heist is being explained by the team in a warehouse, originally Chris was standing next to me, and he's so tall, and Tig might be shorter than me, so I had to be there for her shooting that scene just to get the eye lines right.
2020’s unprecedented events did cause a hiccup for the world of film productions, and Army of the Dead was no exception. As Ana de la Reguera, Dave Bautista and the rest of the principal cast had wrapped filming in 2019, Tig Notaro’s last minute addition required some of that Zack Snyder magic that also saw him complete Zack Snyder’s Justice League for HBO Max around the same timeframe. So shooting Notaro’s scenes apparently only required that she interact with Ms. Reguera, as the rest of her role was easily added through extensive digital effects.
While there’s probably a way that CGI and clever editing could have blurred the lines between Tig Notaro’s performance and the original Army of the Dead footage, those results would have still stuck out. Ana de la Reguera’s mention of eye lines, and even just the personal nature of that rooftop scene, are exceptions where the otherwise seamless blending Notaro into the film would have been stretched. So at least two scenes saw Tig Notaro actually get to interact with a human being from the cast; and her scenes with Reguera make Army of the Dead even more of a technical marvel.
Whether you’ve seen Army of the Dead or have it added to your watchlist for the next available opportunity, keeping this story in mind makes the end result all the more impressive. Though should there be a sequel, on top of the prequels that are already on the books, let’s hope that Tig Notaro somehow gets to play with the entire cast this time around.
