Director Stanley Kubrick was considered a perfectionist, where every detail had to be right. However, the numerous repetitions of a scene led to actress Shelley Duvall becoming completely exhausted in “The Shining.”
Director Stanley Kubrick († March 7, 1999) was known for ensuring that even the smallest aspects of his works had to be perfect. He would often repeat individual scenes until he was completely satisfied. For instance, a scene with 148 repetitions made it into the Guinness World Records.
Shelley Duvall, who played Wendy in the film, spoke in an interview about filming a scene in the cult film “The Shining,” which was very strenuous for her.
Here you can see a trailer for The Shining:
The actress talked in an interview in November 2016 with comingsoon.net about working with the demanding director.
She said she had nothing against Stanley Kubrick and even shared a few nice moments with him. However, sometimes she had significant clashes with the director:
Oh, Stanley really does have a bad reputation sometimes, but he was a perfectionist. We had our moments where we laughed and joked on set, but there were also times when we just clashed.
I am a very stubborn person and don’t like being bossed around or told what to do, but Stanley pushed and pushed to get the performance out of me that he wanted.
Shelley Duvall via comingsoon.net
One problem that made the filming difficult for Duvall was that the script was not detailed enough. As a result, the actress could not understand what her character was going through mentally.
While she played a loving housewife who supported her husband, Stanley wanted to see a strong, independent woman.
“It was one of the worst shooting days of my life”
Even in the famous baseball bat scene, the actress did not quite know what the director wanted to see from her.
The shoot was exhausting for Duvall. She was even out of breath multiple times and could not speak properly. “[…] The tears in the film are real!” the actress revealed.
Because the scene was repeated so often, Duvall was tired and angry. She was even close to leaving the set.
Stanley was annoyed with me, yelled at me, the crew was tired, we had all been on set since 5 AM to shoot this ONE scene, and finally, I got it right!
It was one of the worst shooting days of my life; it looked so much easier in the script! But look at what Stanley got out of me, people love this scene!
Shelley Duvall via comingsoon.net
Besides Shelley Duvall, other actors also almost quit their roles during filming, as you can see in the list from our colleagues at Filmstarts.
After numerous repetitions, Director Kubrick was ultimately satisfied with the scene, and the famous baseball bat sequence was finally in the can.
The cult character Jack Torrance from “The Shining” made it as a little Easter egg in Fallout 76. Here film fans can visit the “Torrance House”:
If you know this killer in Fallout 76 from the cinema, you are old…
