Actor Alec Baldwin has had his share of award-winning roles as well as headline-grabbing scandals. The actor has made a mark on stage, films, and TV, with Primetime Emmy awards and Golden Globe awards.
He is also a commercially successful actor with a name and legacy lasting over four decades. Hence, it was very easy for the star to influence the director of the Broadway play Orphans to let go of fellow actor Shia LaBeouf due to creative differences.
Alec Baldwin And Shia LaBeouf Had Creative Differences While On Stage
Actor Alec Baldwin started his career on TV. He slowly shifted to films, having his major breakthrough in Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice and then gaining further notoriety for films such as The Hunt for Red October, Talk Radio, and The Getaway. He had a small appearance in the drama Glengarry Glen Ross.
The actor had a successful stage career in the 90s, where he appeared in many Broadway productions such as A Streetcar Named Desire, Macbeth, and Serious Money. He received a Tony Award nomination for the former. He also received acclaim for his appearance in the sitcom 30 Rock.
After starring in multiple films, such as Martin Scorsese’s The Aviator and The Departed, Baldwin decided to return to the stage with Daniel Sullivan’s production of the Lyle Kessler play Orphans. While the actor was supposed to appear along with Shia LaBeouf in the play, the duo reportedly had a lot of friction during rehearsals.
Talking about it in an interview with Vulture, Baldwin said,
“I loved Lyle Kessler’s play and was anxious to work with director Dan Sullivan. Then Shia LaBeouf showed up. I’d heard from other people that he was potentially very difficult to work with, but I always ignore that because people say the same thing about me. When he showed up, he seemed like a lot of young actors today—scattered, as he was coming from making six movies in a row or whatever…There was friction between us from the beginning.”
Baldwin mentioned that he had an altercation with LaBeouf later in the production, which led to the Transformers actor being fired.
Shia LaBeouf Was Fired From Orphans After Calling Out Alec Baldwin
While rehearsing for Dan Sullivan’s Orphans, actors Alec Baldwin and Shia LaBeouf reportedly had a lot of friction. The two reportedly had different approaches to acting, which did not work for either of them Baldwin described LaBeouf’s approach in an interview with Vulture,
“LaBeouf seems to carry with him, to put it mildly, a jailhouse mentality wherever he goes. When he came to rehearsal, he was told it was important to memorize his lines. He took that to heart and learned all his lines in advance, even emailing me videos in which he read aloud his lines from the entire play. To prove he had put in the time. I, however, do not learn my lines in advance.”
The friction reached its peak when LaBeouf once called out Baldwin for not memorizing his lines in front of everyone. He reportedly accused Baldwin of slowing him down, which prompted Baldwin to talk to the stage manager about the situation. Baldwin said,
“One day he attacked me in front of everyone. He said, “You’re slowing me down, and you don’t know your lines. And if you don’t say your lines, I’m just going to keep saying my lines.”…I took the stage manager, with Sullivan, to another room, and I said one of us is going to go. I said, “I’ll tell you what, I’ll go.” I said don’t fire the kid, I’ll quit. They said no, no, no, no, and they fired him.”
Shia LaBeouf was then let go and replaced by Ben Foster, who played the role of Treat. The play ended up being nominated for two Tony Awards.
Source: Vulture
