20 Things You Didn’t Know About Whiplash

Despite having a relatively brief career, Damien Chazelle has built a reputation for being a very hands-on director who fixates on precision in the footage he captures. While this ensures that his projects are finely-tuned, it does not always lend itself to the most conducive filming environments.

For example, Miles Teller’s drumming scenes (the punishing ones in particular) felt authentic because the actor was exhausted while shooting those sequences. Chazelle would let the scene play out until his lead had nothing left in the tank, never even yelling “Cut” in the process.

These scenes definitely left an impact on audiences, but Teller would have probably preferred a more relaxed means of conveying his character’s toils than exhaustive take after exhaustive take.