It’s not every day that one finds Christian Bale, of all people, running after a director begging and pleading to be cast in one of his movies for a role he deems he can “nail” perfectly, especially not when he has already worked in 3 movies with said director and helped earn more than $1.2 billion at the box office on top of being vehemently praised critically to this day 2 decades after its release.
But this is exactly what has happened, the said director being Christopher Nolan on the project, The Prestige.
The Story Behind Christian Bale’s Casting in The Prestige
Christopher Nolan‘s The Prestige was due to be filmed at the tail end of the 2005 premiere of Batman Begins and history was yet to be made with Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy (it was, at the time, two movies shy of being called a trilogy). As such, when his Batman actor approached the filmmaker asking to be cast in the production, the hesitation and reluctance on Nolan’s part, and the trepidation on Bale’s is understandable when seen from the perspective of two men circa 2006 angling to make a name and find a solid footing in the formative years of their career in the film industry.
What Christian Bale recalled about the time was later recorded in an interview as the actor said:
“Chris didn’t actually come to me with this. I actually read the script and I called him up and said, ‘I want in. I like Borden. I can really nail this character.’ You know, the question was could he see me as anything other than Bruce Wayne? And he said, ‘Yeah, go for it.’
[Borden] just was the one I was fascinated with throughout. The fact that he relies upon secrecy not only for his livelihood, but for his very life […] It was his first love regardless of other relationships, the secrecy was paramount and his obsession is absolutely necessary to achieve the level of skill that he does. There were so many mysteries surrounding this one character that he was immediately the one I wanted to play.”
Despite the fear, trepidation, hesitation, and every other insecurity that worked its claws into the developing relationship that defined Nolan and Bale’s work over the next 6 years then washed away. Instead, the two industry greats made brought home 2 Academy Award nominations for the 2006 film and went on to add 1 more to the collection when the late Heath Ledger won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Joker in the 2008 film, The Dark Knight.
Christian Bale Evades the Curse of Typecasting in Hollywood
An actor of a caliber such as Christian Bale shouldn’t be evoked as an example of how not to be stereotyped in Hollywood. The impossible range, variety, power, and dynamic scope of his roles have already spoken for the actor’s capabilities in front of a lens. Even before putting on the cape and the cowl, Christian Bale gave 3 powerful performances: Empire of the Sun (1987), American Psycho (2000), and The Machinist (2004).
Each of these films brought out such an entirely different persona in Bale that it becomes hard to believe one young actor could display this much skill and sensationalism in his formative movie roles. Of course, Bale was careful enough to be smart about which movies he cherry-picked from the line-up after his rise to fame following Batman Begins. And Christian Bale’s The Prestige was the perfect project to get him back in the game as a powerhouse actor who refused to be boxed in as an action hero of the 21st century.
The Dark Knight trilogy is available for streaming on Max.
Source: Movie Hole
