10 Movie Scenes That Were Incredibly Awkward On Set

5. Stanley Kubrick Bullied Shelley Duvall To The Point Of A Nervous Breakdown - The Shining

The Scene

The unforgettable sequence where Wendy Torrance (Shelley Duvall) tries to fend off her husband Jack's (Jack Nicholson) murderous advances with a baseball bat.

The Awkwardness

Much has been written of director Stanley Kubrick's flagrant abuse of Duvall over the course of filming his horror masterpiece, which included routinely criticising her performance and instructing the crew to be standoffish with her. This reportedly reached its apex during filming of the baseball bat scene.

A mind-blowing 127 takes were shot before Kubrick was ready to move on, which given the enormously intense nature of the sequence, would be extremely taxing for just about any actor.

As a result of this scene and the generally stressful nature of Kubrick's combative, bullying attitude towards her, Duvall became ill for many months, even causing her hair to fall out.

Duvall incredulously received a Worst Actress Razzie nomination for her performance, and after two decades of on-off work in Hollywood, she retired in 2002, after which she became a recluse and more recently has struggled with mental health issues.

Many fans have speculated as to whether or not Kubrick's dictatorial methods and particular vitriol towards Duvall could be to blame for her personal issues. Whether that's true or not, it's honestly tough to watch the scene in question without considering just how much of Duvall's performance isn't really much of a performance at all.

Whether you blame Kubrick or not for Duvall's more recent struggles, there's no denying the eyebrow-raising nature of his methods. In 2019, can any filmmaker really make a reasonable case for putting an actor through so much emotional turmoil?