Whitney Cummings details “humiliating” audition for Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘Megalopolis’
Actor and stand-up comedian Whitney Cummings has discussed her uncomfortable audition for Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis, which hit theatres earlier this year with a resounding thud. Cummings is known for her comedic sitcoms 2 Broke Girls and Whitney, as well as for her stand-up specials.
Speaking on her podcast Good for You earlier this week, Cummings detailed how she had received a call from the legendary director in which he told her he wanted her to audition for the film. The comedian prepared exhaustively for days and spent hours in hair and makeup to prepare, but when she arrived in the room, she discovered that her expectations had been all wrong.
“Everyone is so quiet,” she said. “There’s no vibe of, ‘We’re at an audition. Hey, what’s up? Hi, how are you? Nice to meet you.’ It’s just so awkward.” She asked where they wanted to start in the script, only for the director to respond that he just wanted to do improvisation.
“He would just throw things at me,” she said, remembering that he asked her to do an English accent and bid farewell to her son, who was going to war, and then to do an Australian accent to interact with her husband, who was leaving her for her sister.
The issue for Cummings wasn’t the improvisation as much as it was having Coppola as a scene partner. For all his virtuosity as a director, he is not an actor, and, according to the comedian, did not improvise particularly well. She left the audition on the verge of tears, but it wasn’t over yet. The director had a parting gift.
“He gives me a signed copy of his new book,” she said. “He signed it in front of me as if I had shown up to an autograph signing as if I wanted [it]. Like, thank you. And then gave me a bottle of Francis Ford Coppola wine. It was just so humiliating — that’s the only [word] — and so confounding in that moment.”
The controversies surrounding ‘Megalopolis’
Cummings is not the only actor to have had uncomfortable experiences with Coppola and his self-financed flop. Aside from its terrible reviews and catastrophic box office returns, the film was mired in controversy even before it was released.
First, a video emerged of the director kissing extras during the production. Later, a trailer for the film was taken down when it was revealed to contain quotes from reviews that didn’t exist. Then, there was the ongoing controversy about Coppola’s decision to cast Shia LaBeouf, whose alleged personal conduct and process on-set have been raising questions for years.
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