10 Infamous Times Actors Refused To Break Character

Tommy Wiseau – the enigmatic legend behind the best worst movie of all time, The Room – is quite a curious character. Nobody is sure where he came from, where he got the $6 million he used to make The Room or even if Tommy Wiseau is his real name. All we really know is that he’s pretty peculiar and thinks that his film is a masterpiece.

So, when James Franco directed The Disaster Artist – a comedy-drama about the making of The Room in which Franco also stars as Wiseau – he decided to go as meta as the movie itself and as weird as Wiseau by never breaking character throughout the shoot.

Essentially, that meant Franco was directing a movie about directing a movie that Tommy Wiseau both directed and starred in while staying in character as Wiseau the whole time. Confused? So were Franco’s cast and crew, apparently.

His brother Dave Franco, who played Wiseau’s BFF Greg Sestero in the film, would prep newcomers to the set by telling them that Tommy and not James would be directing that day. Co-star Seth Rogen claims Franco’s constantly staying in character was so convincing that people would ask him where James was. Even Rogen’s grandmother, who visited the set one day, was hoodwinked by Franco’s act and asked her grandson “I thought James was in the movie?”

Deceiving cast, crew and Rogen’s grandma worked, however, and Franco received a tonne of critical acclaim for his spot-on portrayal of Wiseau.