The “Frankenstein” star has stated that his Oscar-nominated performance in Guillermo del Toro’s epic adaptation might not have happened if he had followed his mother’s advice, although he is allegedly planning to take his mother, Melissa, to the Oscars next month, at which he will be awarded for best supporting actor.
It turns out that after she recorded the eerie-looking DVD cover for “Pan’s Labyrinth,” she attempted to prevent him from ever collaborating with del Toro before Elordi had even achieved professional acting status.
Elordi recounted how, when he was ten years old, he would “raid the horror aisle” at the DVD rental chain Blockbuster when he first came across an edition of del Toro’s 2006 film “Pan’s Labyrinth.”
He added, “And I saw the tree and the little girl, and I turned it around, the DVD case, and I saw the Pale Man. And I remember thinking, what is that?”
Despite the movie’s “M” rating for “mature” under the Australian film classification framework, Elordi’s mom grudgingly agreed to let him borrow it at the stipulation that “you must never work with this man.”
While conversing with del Toro at a BFI IMAX screening of the movie in London, the actor laughed as he described the incident, adding, “And lo and behold.”
“It’s good to disobey one’s mother,” Del Toro said. A fortuitous turn of events led to Elordi’s casting, as del Toro had another actor originally intended for the part, who withdrew nine weeks before the beginning of filming. In addition to having just four weeks to get ready, Elordi claimed he was ” so excited and so sure when I read the screenplay for the first time, that I had no fear… there’s no other filmmaker on this planet that could make a truly great ‘Frankenstein’ film.”
