Alex Garland & Producer Andrew Macdonald On The Viral ‘Ex Machina’ Dance Scene And Almost Casting Jake Gyllenhaal As The Film’s Lead: “It Was Never Gonna Work” — Edinburgh

Jake Gyllenhaal almost landed in one of the lead roles in Alex Garland’s Oscar-winning debut feature Ex Machina after the filmmaker and his longtime producer, Andrew Macdonald, were pushed to consider the actor to secure financing. 

“The sales companies wanted us to cast Jake Gyllenhaal because he was bankable and they could sell foreign territories,” Macdonald said yesterday afternoon during a Q&A alongside Garland at this year’s Edinburgh Film Festival. 

“That would have changed the whole film,” Macdonald continued adding that that negotiations with Gyllenhaal’s reps ultimately didn’t go far.

“I remember having a conversation with Jake Gyllenhaal’s lawyer about his needs. It was never gonna work,” Macdonald said to laughs from the packed ground in Edinburgh. 

Alicia Vikander and Oscar Isaac were later cast in the film’s lead roles. But Macdonald added that at the time, neither actor carried enough weight to “raise the money through international sales.” Macdonald and Garland instead decided to turn to Hollywood to secure financing, which they said offered them the freedom to pull in the collaborators they wanted thanks to a unique set of circumstances. 

“We decided to make the film with Universal International and they had a film with Oscar Isaac, the Coen brothers film, and they believed it would win Oscars, so they thought he was a winner,” Macdonald said. “They also had an Alicia Vikander film that they thought was gonna be a winner as well, so they backed us.” 

Garland described Ex Machina as his favorite directorial effort so far and said it served as an antidote to some of the “toxic” film sets he had spent time on as a writer. 

“The cast was young and hard-working and committed,” Garland said of his Ex Machina crew. “We had a friendly crew that believed in the project and were working hard. There was a good vibe, and everyone was pulling together.”

Garland continued to share a little more insight on Ex Machina, telling the audience the origins of the film’s now-viral disco dancing scene. In the scene, Oscar Isaac’s mad billionaire Nathan breaks out into a spontaneous dance with his mute, human android played by Sonoya Mizuno. 

Garland said he constructed the scene to intentionally break the film’s tone in an attempt to avoid feeling monotonous like Never Let Me Go, a 2010 feature directed by American filmmaker Mark Romanek and penned by Garland. 

“I remember showing the film to my then-wife who said it was a very solid 6/10,” Garland said of Never Let Me Go. “The problem the film had had nothing to do with the source material. That was a brilliant novel. The film hit a particular note but then didn’t vary that note. It’s a good film in some ways, but flawed in that respect.”

Garland added: “The reason that the Ex Machina disco dancing scene exists is because of Never Let Me Go. I thought I had to disrupt what was happening in the film. I couldn’t be afraid to disrupt the tone. In fact, I had to seek out to disrupt the tone. And it turned out to be a GIF.” 

Never Let Me Go was an adaptation of Nobel Prize winner Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel of the same name and one of the last screenplays Garland wrote for another director. Garland would go on to direct Ex Machina, Annihilation, Men, and Civil War, all with Macdonald on board as producer. The pair have once again reteamed to revisit one of their earlier projects, the zombie flick 28 days later. Garland has penned a sequel titled 28 Years Later, which is set as the first part of a 28 Years trilogy. Danny Boyle is directing the feature, which Macdonald confirmed has completed production and is set in the north of England.

“Tomorrow morning we start part two. And then we hope there’s gonna be a third part and it’s a trilogy,” Macdonald said.

The Edinburgh Film Festival ends on Wednesday.