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There are plenty of rumors about actors having strict or strange demands on set, but some are more substantial than others.
Here are 7 actors who allegedly had a “no eye contact” rule on set:
1.
On a 2023 episode of the Pod Meets World podcast, Rider Strong said, “I did a movie [Benefit of the Doubt] with Donald Sutherland, and he [reportedly] has an eye contact rule. Nobody can make eye contact with him. If you’re in the scene with him, you could make eye contact with him, but his whole thing was that every crew member has to look away.”
2.
In a 2010 interview with Kim Dickens, AV Club writer Steve Heisler said, “I was an extra in The Lake House when Sandra Bullock was in it, and we were told that we were not allowed to make eye contact with her unless she initiated the eye contact.”
3.
When Jessica Alba appeared on Hot Ones in 2020, she said, “On the set of 90210, I couldn’t even make eye contact with any of the cast members, which was really strange when you’re, like, trying to do a scene with them. Yeah, it was like, ‘You’re not allowed to make eye contact with any one of the cast members, or you’ll be thrown off the set.'”
4.
In 2023, radio host Jay Brody tweeted, “Mike Myers had me fired off the set of ‘The Love Guru’ because I made eye contact with him, and I was there as his body guard…”
5.
In 2019, a source from the Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood set alleged to The Hollywood Reporter that some crew were told not to make eye contact with Leonardo DiCaprio.
6.
During a 2020 episode of his radio show 4BC Breakfast, Neil Breen, a former executive producer on Australia’s Today, reportedly said that, when Ellen DeGeneres appeared on the morning show in 2013, the staff were given strict instructions. He alleged her team told him, “Neil, no one’s to talk to Ellen. So you don’t talk to her, you don’t approach her, you don’t look at her. She’ll come in, she’ll sit down, she’ll talk to Richard [Wilkins], then Ellen will leave.”
7.
And in a 1999 lawsuit, a group of Sylvester Stallone’s former household staff who were suing him for unfair dismissal alleged that, when he walked into a room, they were required to “back out and vanish immediately” and never meet his eyes or talk to his mom, let they be fired immediately.
And here are 8 actors who reportedly had other wild on-set demands:
8.
In his Gone Girl commentary, director David Fincher said, “There’s a moment described at the end of this scene where Nick Dunne has to reach into his duffle bag or his backpack and get out a baseball cap that he’s bought at the airport, and he puts it on and walks away and hopes that people don’t recognize him from the television and put together that that’s him, that he’s in their presence. And I really wanted it to be a Yankees cap, but, being from Boston and not being very professional as an actor, Ben [Affleck] refused to wear a Yankees cap. It did not come to blows, but we had to shut down production for four days as we negotiated with Patrick Whitesell over what would be the best thing for the movie.”
9.
According to the Washington Post in 1993, Kim Basinger reportedly requested “copious quantities of Evian water for washing her hair” while filming The Marrying Man.
10.
On a 2024 episode of the Dinner’s On Me podcast, Kyle MacLachlan said that, while filming The Flinstones, Elizabeth Taylor “had to have a gift every day.”
11.
According to Rotten Tomatoes, Jack Nicholson reportedly banned Celtics gear from the set of The Departed in Boston because he’s a big LA Lakers fan.
12.
In 2020, Annabelle Wallis told The Hollywood Reporter, “I got to run on-screen with [Tom Cruise in The Mummy], but he told me no at first. He said, ‘Nobody runs on-screen [with me],’ and I said, ‘But I’m a really good runner.'”
13.
Appearing on Conan in 2016, Zooey Deschanel said that, when Prince guest starred on New Girl, the Kardashians’ cameo was removed from a party scene because he didn’t think they’d be at one of his parties IRL.
14.
In 1988, Gary Busey was in a motorcycle crash, and in brain surgery, he died on the table before coming back to life. In 2012, his Quigley costar Curtis Armstrong told the AV Club Toronto, “We were shooting this movie — which is a horrible movie — and he was supposed to come back from the dead. And he, of course, Gary Busey, supposedly had done this — he’d been in an accident and died and came back. He showed up on a set made to look like Heaven, and he looked around and said, ‘I can’t play this scene.’ They were three days behind at this point.”
15.
And finally, in 2016, Amy Hill told the AV Club that, on the The Cat in the Hat set, Mike Myers “had his handlers dress his trailer, and his area was all covered with tenting because he didn’t want anybody seeing him.” She also claimed that, though she’d get there at “the crack of dawn,” everyone “would all be waiting for Mike Myers to come.”
