3. Werner Herzog Vs. Klaus Kinski
Even though many directors and actors have extremely heated arguments, few have escalated to the point where one of the parties flat out threatened to murder the other one. Then again there are very few actor-director relationships that are anything like the one shared between Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski. Herzog had a reputation for being shall we say, an innovative director. His belief was that a story only works if it's real to the people involved. This might explain why he chose to make Aguirre, the Wrath of God very similar to the Spanish Expedition they were portraying. So similar in fact that the movie was filmed in unexplored regions of the Peru jungle, putting the cast and crew under enormous pressure in an extremely hostile environment. If one actor was up for that challenge though, it would be Klaus Kinski. Kinski was a special kind of actor, the kind that had a reputation for throwing tantrums frequently. While sharing an apartment with Herzog, Kinski once spent 48 hours locked in a bathroom where he spent his time smashing everything in the room to pieces. Even he couldn't handle the insanity on the set of Aguirre though and eventually he threatened to leave. Thankfully - since he was a sane and understanding person - Herzog was able to persuade Kinski to stay. He managed to do this by casually telling Kinski he had nine bullets in his gun. If Kinski left, eight would be used on him and the ninth bullet would be used on Herzog. To be fair, this account hasn't been confirmed by both parties and Kinski had a different version of the story. A version where he claims, "I was the only one with a gun on set." Even with the insanity that came with the making of Aquirre, Herzog and Kinski had some sort of powerful bond since they made four more films together. What kind of bond it was remains a mystery to this day though. Kinski called Herzog a "nasty, sadistic, treacherous, cowardly creep" in his autobiography. Herzog responded eight years after Kinski's death by releasing a documentary about him entitled My Best Fiend (no spelling errors).