Here’s A Full Breakdown Of Charlize Theron And Tom Hardy’s “Mad Max” Feud, Which Left Charlize Feeling So Scared And Unsafe She Requested Protection
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In 2022, a tell-all book about the making of Mad Max: Fury Road made a series of bombshell revelations about the tense working conditions on set — particularly between the two stars, Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy.
The movie was released in 2015, and New York Times journalist Kyle Buchanan interviewed more than 150 people involved in the almost two-decade making of it for Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road.
While it was previously known that Charlize and Tom were at loggerheads throughout filming in the Namibian desert, Charlize did not hold back as she revealed the full extent of their feud in the book.
The actor told Buchanan she felt so intimidated by Tom on set that she requested additional protection. She also accused the movie’s producer, Doug Mitchell, of forgiving Tom’s “really bad behavior” because he is a man.
An assistant cameraman seemingly echoed this, saying that Tom was “very provocative” on the shoot, and described Charlize as the opposite.
The movie’s editor, J. Houston Yang, also gave his two cents, saying: “Boy fucking howdy, was it clear that those two people hated each other. They didn’t want to touch each other, they didn’t want to look at each other, they wouldn’t face each other if the camera wasn’t actively rolling.”
Meanwhile, camera operator Mark Goellnicht claimed that the “turning point” between the two actors was when Tom showed up to the set three hours late despite a “special request” to be punctual.
At the time, new mom Charlize had her baby at a nearby childcare facility while she worked, and was furious when Tom left the cast and crew waiting around for hours.
According to Mark, Charlize stayed in position to shoot the scene for the entire time. He recalled: “She didn’t go to the bathroom, didn’t do anything. She just sat in the War Rig. She's now in the War Rig, sitting there with her makeup on and a full costume for three hours.”
“Tom turns up, and he walks casually across the desert. She jumps out of the War Rig, and she starts swearing her head off at him,” he went on.
Mark quoted Charlize as shouting: "Fine the fucking cunt a hundred thousand dollars for every minute that he's held up this crew," and: "How disrespectful you are!"
“She screams it out. It's so loud, it's so windy,” Mark added. “He might've heard some of it, but he charged up to her and went, 'What did you say to me?' He was quite aggressive. She really felt threatened, and that was the turning point, because then she said, 'I want someone as protection.' She then had a producer that was assigned to be with her all the time."
Charlize corroborated Mark’s story, and said that producer Denise Di Novi was drafted in to help when she asked for a woman to be added into a position of power on set to “equalize” the tension.
She added: “It got to a place where it was kind of out of hand, and there was a sense that maybe sending a woman producer down could maybe equalize some of it.”
“A lot of what I felt was coming my way from Doug was…oh, [screw] it. I’ll just say it. It was a man forgiving another man for really bad behavior, and I didn’t feel safe,” Charlize stated.
But after Denise was hired, director George Miller apparently barred her from the set — leaving Charlize feeling “pretty naked and alone.”
“You understand the needs of a director who wants to protect his set, but when push comes to shove and things get out of hand, you have to be able to think about that in a bigger sense,” she said. “That’s where we could have done better, if George trusted that nobody was going to come and fuck with his vision but was just going to come and help mediate situations.”
Charlize added that she felt like she was “walking on thin ice” for several weeks of the shoot, and George confessed in the book that he would “probably be more mindful” if confronted with the same situation again.
Charlize also has her regrets, admitting that she feels guilty over her and Tom’s costars having to experience such a hostile work environment.
During an appearance on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, Zoë Kravitz said of the pair: “They didn’t get along. It was also in the desert for so long, I think everyone was tired, and confused, and homesick. We saw nothing but sand for six months; you go crazy.”
And Nicholas Hoult compared the atmosphere to being “on your summer holidays and the adults in the front of the car are arguing,” which Charlize agreed with as she apologized for her role in it.
“We were either fighting or we were icing each other — I don’t know which one is worse — and [our costars] had to deal with it in the back,” she recalled. “It was horrible! We should not have done that; we should have been better… It was not a conducive working environment, I apologize profusely.”
“I don't want to make excuses for bad behavior, but it was a tough shoot. Now, I have a very clear perspective on what went down,” Charlize added. “I don't think I had that clarity when we were making the movie. I was in survival mode; I was really scared shitless."
Despite this, Tom denied that Charlize was ever “frightened” of him, saying: “She’s a very serious actor. So, I don’t see why she would ever be intimidated by me or in any way feel frightened. I think that was more bollocks.”
However, he did acknowledge that he wasn’t “experienced” enough for the role and struggled to handle an “overwhelming” situation, adding: “In hindsight, I was in over my head in many ways. The pressure on both of us was overwhelming at times.”
Charlize also expressed empathy toward Tom as she referenced the fact that he was taking over an iconic role from Mel Gibson, who originated the character in the Mad Max franchise’s previous installments.
“In retrospect, I didn't have enough empathy to really, truly understand what he must have felt like to step into Mel Gibson's shoes,” she said. “I think because of my own fear, we were putting up walls to protect ourselves instead of saying to each other, 'This is scary for you, and it's scary for me, too. Let's be nice to each other.' In a weird way, we were functioning like our characters: Everything was about survival."
And George Miller, the director, has now said that there was “no excuse” for the way that Tom and Charlize behaved on set in a new interview with the Telegraph, where he also revealed that Tom would refuse to leave his trailer at times.
George added that the feud seemed to stem from the simple fact that the stars “were just two very different performers” and had opposing approaches to the movie.
“Tom has a damage to him but also a brilliance that comes with it, and whatever was going on with him at the time, he had to be coaxed out of his trailer,” he told the publication.
And it was Tom’s tardiness that rattled Charlize, with George adding: “Whereas Charlize was incredibly disciplined — a dancer by training, which told in the precision of her performance — and always the first one on set.”
Echoing what Charlize previously said, George insisted: “I’m an optimist, so I saw their behavior as mirroring their characters, where they had to learn to cooperate in order to ensure mutual survival.”
However, he then reiterated: “There’s no excuse for it, and I think there’s a tendency in this business to use great performances as an excuse for other disruption that could be avoided.”
George’s interview comes ahead of the release of the movie’s prequel, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, starring Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth.
While Anya and Chris appear to have gotten along incredibly well during the shoot, Anya concerned fans when she repeatedly alluded to a difficult filming experience in a recent interview with the New York Times.
“I’ve never been more alone than making that movie. I don’t want to go too deep into it, but everything that I thought was going to be easy was hard,” she told the publication.
When pressed on what exactly about the movie had proved harder than anticipated, Anya reportedly had a “faraway look in her eyes” before ultimately refusing to answer and telling the journalist: “Talk to me in 20 years. Talk to me in 20 years.”
Later in the interview, Anya said that “months” went by without her speaking a single line during filming, and while she was sure to reiterate her love and respect for George, she suggested that she struggled with his direction.
“He had a very, very strict idea of what [Anya’s character] Furiosa’s war face looked like, and that only allowed me my eyes for a large portion of the movie. It was very much ‘mouth closed, no emotion, speak with your eyes.’ That’s it, that’s all you have,” Anya explained. “I am a really strong advocate of female rage. We’re animals, and there’s a point where somebody just snaps. There’s one scream in that movie, and I am not joking when I tell you that I fought for that scream for three months.”
Interestingly, Charlize recalled a similar experience during filming for Fury Road, where she said that she had to demand her character had a cathartic outburst — ultimately leading to Charlize improvising a now-iconic scene where she drops to her knees and lets out a primal scream.
Anya concluded her interview by saying that shooting a Mad Max movie is “a very particular story to have,” and that there is “an immediate kinship” between those who have experienced it.
Referencing Charlize directly, she added: “We are due a sit-down, hash-it-out dinner."
You can buy a copy of Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road here.
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