Marvel’s ‘Ant-Man: Quantumania’ Had To Shut Down Production Because Of Too Much Manure On Set, According to Paul Rudd

Marvel

Feb 25

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania — Image Source: Marvel Studios

Movie productions had their share of disruptions during the last few years. Lockdowns, Covid-sicknesses, or quarantines took their toll on casts and crews, who tried to get their work out as quickly and efficiently as possible. But sometimes, the cause of a delay in the shooting schedule is much smaller than a global pandemic.

The first decade of this century was the high time of green screens. Actors were often boxed in on giant sound stages, surrounded just by green walls, and only had a tennis ball or a piece of tape as a reference for someone or something that would be added digitally in post-production.

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This has changed somewhat nowadays when even big productions apply at least partly practical sets or even shoot on real locations to get a more realistic look and to give the actors more context. Even CGI juggernauts like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania follow this trend, though it is admittedly hard to find a real-life location similar to the Quantum Real - a world that exists just on a sub-atomic level.

While such a production would have been green screen mayhem in the mid-2000s, there is now the Volume, the new production technology that was first used for Lucasfilm’s The Mandalorian and consists of a large number of LCD screens that project the surrounding landscape and constantly change perspective following the movement of the cameras. But even a high-tech tool like the Volume includes some physical components, like a spaceship, rocks, or dirt on the ground.

Paul Rudd, who reprises the role of Scott Lang/Ant-Man in Peyton Reed’s three-quel, remembers:

“They have like, dirt, and they try and have as much practical stuff as possible. You really feel like you’re on a planet or you’re in some weird space.”

Only that it wasn’t just “dirt.” Rudd continues:

“One of the things, we went in and there was dirt all over the floor, and we were shooting with 150 other creatures and people, and it doesn’t smell good at all. And throughout the day, it was kind of getting worse and worse, and the next day, it was overbearing, and we realize they probably got a deal on the dirt because it wasn’t dirt, it was manure.”

When the situation got unbearable, production had to be stopped for one day while the crew took out the manure and put in “real” dirt before shooting could commence. While this slight delay was ultimately insignificant compared to the problems the production was facing while shooting at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, it is another example of buying cheap often ends up quite expensive, even if it is just dirt.

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania made more than $ 260 Mio during its first week, so the manure incident doesn’t seem to be a bad omen, despite Rudd fearing that “If the movie is anything like the substance we were walking on, we’re in real trouble.”

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