Christopher Reeve was just as blunt after working with Brando on Superman. Asked whether it had been exciting to work with one of his acting idols, Reeve said, “Not really, no. The man didn’t care.” He added that Brando “took the two million and ran” and complained that watching someone of Brando’s ability “phone it in” was painful because Reeve himself cared so much about the work. That is a pretty brutal review from the guy playing your son.
Sophia Loren’s story from A Countess From Hong Kong is darker. In her memoir, she recalled that Brando suddenly “put his hands on me.” She said she immediately warned him, “Don’t you ever dare to do that again. Never again!” According to Loren, he never did — but “it was very difficult working with him after that.” She later described Brando as someone whose personal problems could make life difficult for the entire crew.
And then there was Dennis Hopper on Apocalypse Now. Hopper later said, “We had a lot of problems together.” Their relationship got so bad that Brando reportedly refused to be on set when Hopper was there, forcing parts of their material to be filmed separately. Which is honestly impressive: most people who hate a co-worker just avoid them at lunch. Brando apparently made production redesign the workday around it.
To be fair, plenty of actors revered Brando and spoke about learning from him, and Loren herself still called him a “great, great actor.” But yeah… sounds like at times the method actor was a method asshole.
