Warren Driven to Edge in First Film
April 27 -- Swimmer Estella Warren may be new to the acting world, but the 22-year-old Sports Illustrated beauty held her own during the tough shoot of Driven, says Die Hard 2 director Renny Harlin, who adds that it was her ranking as Maxim's Most Beautiful Girl that led him to cast the untried performer.
"She seems young and vulnerable but she moved away from home at 15. She can take anything. … She is not a little flower when someone's nasty to her," says the director, who was very, very nasty to his ingénue on the set of the Sylvester Stallone action film.
To get Warren to convincingly cry during an emotional breakup scene, Harlin was as ruthless as a shark from his own Deep Blue Sea. "Those tears are real," Harlin pointed out. "I completely destroyed her to make her cry. People were horrified and the crew hated me that day."
Instead of taking Warren off the set for a private pep talk, Harlin turned her awkwardness into a public disgrace. "I talked to her in my megaphone, 'Who do you think you are? You're just a pretty face. A model who doesn't know anything about acting!'"
The brutal tactic brought the desired results. "She tried to hold back the tears to do the scene, and that's what people do in real life, try to hold back their emotions," said a pleased Harlin.
"We'd been shooting the scene for a few hours and we didn't have much time left and so I had the cinematographer put two [film] magazines in and they're 10 minutes max, and I said, 'Never cut. No matter what I do.' I'd run and shake her and say, 'You're worth nothing! And you're going to ruin the whole movie!' and the moment I said 'Cut,' she just collapsed and started crying.
"Then I put my arms around her and said, 'I had to do it,' and she immediately thanked me. She said that's what her [swimming] coach would do. That's what she's used to."
Having been linked to his previous leading lady (and ex-wife) Geena Davis, Harlin admits, "I'm completely in love with Estella … but in a fatherly or motherly way because she's so young."
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