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Making of ‘Gladiator II’: Rome Wasn’t Re-Built in a Day — It Took Nearly 25 Years
The Hollywood ReporterStory by Ryan Gajewski
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After 25 years, Ridley Scott finally gets his rhinoceros as the director brings his blockbuster 'Gladiator' back to life with a star-studded sequel, 'Gladiator II'.
beat sheet
- Ridley Scott landed on Irish actor Paul Mescal to play Maximus' son Lucius, after initially considering Timothée Chalamet and Miles Teller for the role, with Mescal impressing Scott with his 'shirt-ripping performance' as Stanley Kowalski in a West End revival of 'A Streetcar Named Desire'.
- The production spared no expense, with a quarter-mile long recreation of the Colosseum in Malta and elaborate action sequences including a naval battle where the arena was flooded - a historically accurate, if Hollywood-ized, touch according to a classics professor.
call sheet
Ridley Scott, Russell Crowe, Joaquin Phoenix, John Logan, Nick Cave, David Scarpa, Paul Mescal, Timothée Chalamet, Miles Teller, Connie Nielsen, Denzel Washington, Joseph Quinn, Barry Keoghan, Fred Hechinger, John Mathieson, Arthur Max, Paramount, Industrial Light and Magic, DreamWorks, Hulu, Marvel, Universal, Gladiator II, Gladiator, Prometheus, Alien: Covenant, All the Money in the World, Napoleon, Normal People, A Streetcar Named Desire, Stranger Things, Kraven the Hunter, Wicked