Production Companies Warner Bros. Pictures, Intermedia Films, Pacifica Film, Egmond Film & Television, France 3 Cinéma, IMF Internationale Medien und Film GmbH & Co. 3. Produktions KG, Pathé Renn Productions
Cast as Alexander’s closest lifelong companion Hephaistion is Jared Leto, rising star of such films as Panic Room, Requiem for a Dream and Girl, Interrupted. “It was my first audition since Panic Room, which was a couple of years before, and I was completely petrified,” confesses Leto. “There were 50 other people there to meet Oliver, and it was incredibly intimidating. But when I auditioned, thankfully, he saw something in me that he thought might be right for Hephaistion. I’ll be eternally grateful to him for believing in me and giving me this experience. He works harder than any other person on the set. He’s obsessed, he’s a mad genius, like Van Gogh or Beethoven. He’s taught me a lot on this film, and I’ll carry those things with me for the rest of my career.”
Leto also appreciated the presence of his co-star. “Making the movie with anyone other than Colin wouldn’t have been such an incredible experience,” says Jared Leto. “First of all, he’s a friend. He’s also a tremendous actor, really generous, and incredibly committed. He raised the bar for all of us. He’s got a lot of Alexander in him, and it was easy for us to see Colin in that part.”
“Colin was Alexander,” concurs Rosario Dawson, who was cast by Stone as princess Roxane, Alexander’s first wife. “Colin’s just got that presence, and you can see the Pied Piper in him. It was magic, and it was really wonderful for me. Young actors don’t usually give you that much – they’re not that generous, or prepared, or confident in their own talent.”
Working with legendary director Stone drew Dawson to the project immediately. “I always wanted to work with Oliver,” she enthuses. “When I first heard about the film, I wondered what kind of roles there were in it for women. We talked for a while, shot a screen test, and after an hour-and-a-half he was calling me ‘Roxane.’”
For two relatively brief but crucial roles, Stone reached out to two of the world’s most distinguished actors. As the elder Pharaoh Ptolemy, the film’s storyteller and central voice, Anthony Hopkins was only too pleased to reunite with Stone eight years after their fruitful partnership on Nixon. “Oliver Stone is one of the most extraordinary directors, and I’ve worked with some really great ones,” notes Hopkins. “There’s nothing safe about Oliver, and there’s nothing safe about his films. They are brilliant and outrageous.”
“Once Anthony gets it right, he doesn’t let go,” Stone says. “He’s like a dog with a bone. He works quietly, methodically, and as he goes, sucks more and more of the marrow. On his last day in front of the cameras, Anthony worked until three or four in the morning to finish, which means it was an eighteen to twenty hour day. It killed everybody except him – Anthony loved it. He said ‘I love to work hard, and I don’t like to sit and screw around on set. I wish you had come to me with seventy days of pain!’”
“They were pretty intense days,” Hopkins confirms, “but I felt fantastic at the end of it. Working with Oliver is intense, because he drives and needles you in a good, constructive way. But it was the most satisfying time I’ve had on a set for a long time.”
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