In a recent segment of the podcast “How to Fail with Elizabeth Day,” Rosamund Pike discussed the “catastrophe” of starring in the 2005 video game version of “Doom.”
Karl Urban and Dwayne Johnson starred in Andrzej Bartkowiak’s science fiction action film. After making his debut as an antagonist in the James Bond film “Die Another Day,” Pike was still a rising star.
“When I was making ‘Pride & Prejudice’ and I was having great fun in my cornfields in my bonnet, I get a call to be in an action franchise,” Pike said. “They were making a cinema version, a narrative version of the video game ‘Doom.’ And I think in my bonnet, in my field of hay bales, ‘Yeah, I can do anything. I can jump on this hay bale in my crinoline, so I can certainly go and kill some zombies on Mars.’” ( via The Independent)
“So suddenly I’m in this film with the Rock, and I realize how utterly ill-equipped I am to be an action star,” she added. “[There were] macho guys. There were weights on the set. Every time a gun was brought out, it was kind of like a holy relic for the ‘Doom’ fans. I was just out of my comfort zone, out of my league, out of my depth.”
“It was an absolute bomb. I mean, I probably could have ended my career,” Pike said. “It was just probably one of the worst films ever made. I mean, it was a catastrophe. I don’t read the reviews, but you get the sense like you’re lucky to have survived that one.”
The plot of “Doom” revolves around a troop of marines fighting demon-like entities on Mars. After parts in “The Scorpion King” and “Walking Tall,” Johnson’s acting career was also growing, but he was not quite as popular at the box office as he is currently.