Ethan Phillips on Michael Bay

[Grazer]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this - apologies if it isn't but I wanted to share this.

I was fortunate enough to meet Ethan Phillips on Sunday (he was attending an event here in the UK) and I asked him what Michael Bay is like on set cos of all the rumuors that I had heard about him (Ethan starred in The Island) and Ethan had this to say:

"Michael gives 110% every day. He's very creative and passionate about his work and is a great guy to work with. But he can be very hard on his crew, espeically if he feels they are not giving him 100%. He's giving everything he's got and he expects everyone around him to be doing the same.

He loves actors. He was constantly encouraging me to adlib. Ewan would say dude like 40 times a day which I found funny, so Michael just set up a camera and let me go, so that entire scene where they've learned the word Dude (or dood) was pretty much entirely adibbed and put together between myself, Ewan and Michael"

Ethan was a great guy to talk to and seemed to enjoy recalling the events of his time working on The Island. Just wanted to share that :)

(apologies to the moderators if this in the wrong forum)

[Trigger Mike]

Cool. Thanks for the insight!

[devonnewberry]

That's cool. I wonder what Bruce Willis was bitching about then back on the AICN Talk balk or whatever it's called.

[LadiesMan217]

Yeah, Bruce said things like Bay would have destroyed Die Hard 4 and it takes a lot more from a director than just yelling with a megafone, or something like that. He said he liked Armageddon though, but didn't want to work with Michael again. Other actors that have dissed Bay I think includes Billy Bob Thornton, Liv Tyler and Kate Beckinsale but I'm not sure.

Ethan Phillips, perhaps the most likeable character in The Island. Nice to hear he enjoyed working with Bay and seems proud over the film :)

[Bayhem]

"Michael gives 110% every day. He's very creative and passionate about his work and is a great guy to work with. But he can be very hard on his crew, espeically if he feels they are not giving him 100%. He's giving everything he's got and he expects everyone around him to be doing the same.

He loves actors. He was constantly encouraging me to adlib. Ewan would say dude like 40 times a day which I found funny, so Michael just set up a camera and let me go, so that entire scene where they've learned the word Dude (or dood) was pretty much entirely adibbed and put together between myself, Ewan and Michael"




Thanks for sharing this.

Now I know for sure that the "dood" scene was improvised. http://www.shootfortheedit.com/forum/images/icons/icon12.png

[HarryCanyon]

Sounds cool man, i really likes that he likes this fellow.