10 Outrageous Ways Movie Directors Got Performances Out Of Actors
4. Ridley Scott Was At It Again With The Alien Shocks - Prometheus
Never one to shy away from genuinely dealing out a slice of terror to his chosen thespians during the crafting of whatever piece of dreaded sci-fi he's offering up next, Ridley Scott once again opted to scare the crap out of one of his stars during the making of Alien prequel Prometheus.
Many moons on from his decision to not reveal the true extent of what was heading his cast's way in the iconic Alien chestburster scene, the director chose to keep some vital details to himself in the lead-up to Kate Dickie's brush with a Hammerpede in the wake of Rafe Spall's Millburn's rather deadly dance with the snake-like alien.
As revealed by special makeup effects supervisor Neal Scanlan (via IndieWire), "Ridley had indicated something was going to happen." Though the director strategically opted against informing Dickie that the Hammerpede would be yanked out of a dummy of Spall's Millburn when the Ford actor rolled over the corpse.
Sure enough, in Scanlan's words on the matter:
"As we pulled it out, it was clearly an enormous shock to her. The screams are real.”