Austin Abrams has described filming inside a makeshift whale stomach as the “wildest thing I’ve ever done”. The 30-year-old actor, known for Euphoria and Weapons, stars in the upcoming survival thriller Whalefall, which follows Jay Gardiner as he goes diving to find his father’s body before being swallowed whole by a whale.
Filming inside the whale
Filming from inside the whale was not easy, with Abrams sitting alone in a makeshift stomach covered in slime for hours on end. Speaking at the London premiere on Monday, Abrams told the Press Association: “I feel like it was the wildest thing I’ve ever done. I don’t know how it could be pushed more I feel like with what we did with this one.”
Abrams said he was drawn to the “insane” story as it was something he had “never seen before”. “It’s super unique,” he added.
Reuniting with Josh Brolin
Directed by Brian Duffield, the film is based on the 2023 book by Daniel Kraus and sees Abrams reunite with his Weapons co-star Josh Brolin, 58, who plays his on-screen father, Mitt Gardiner. Speaking about working with Brolin, Abrams added: “I was thankful that we shot the stuff on land before we got into the stomach, though, because I feel like it really helped have that history, before I was gone from everyone.”
Brolin, known for No Country For Old Men (2007), Everest (2015), and the Dune franchise, said the fear factor often draws him into a role. He said: “Every fear that I have, I’m dumb enough to walk toward it. A lot of these movies – not that it’s because of the phobia of whales – but a lot of these movies, whether I’m doing Everest (2015) or whether I’m doing a lot of the movies that I do, are chosen because of the fear factor. It scares me. I want to confront it. I want to see what’s going to happen. I want to see if I can show up and most of the time, I do. Not all of the time, but most of the time, I do.”
Challenging production
According to Duffield, the design team built around six stomachs, an oesophagus, a whale mouth both in and out of the water, and a “big robot whale” for the film. He said: “Physically I don’t know how it could be a harder production. Even trying to figure out how a camera could fit in the space. Every day of the shoot was challenging but we all knew that we were doing something that no one had done before, maybe for good reason, but I think the crew and I were all really hungry for the challenge and I’m really proud of how it turned out. I do believe this is like the peak of my challenge. I think now that I’ve done Whalefall I can probably do anything.”
Whalefall is out in UK cinemas from October 16.
