Tom Hardy Spat at Armie Hammer During Mad Max: Fury Road Audition: ‘There Was This Intensity’

Dave Benett/WireImage; Phillip Faraone/Getty Tom Hardy; Armie Hammer

Tom Hardy‘s casting journey for the title role in Mad Max: Fury Road was just as intense as the movie ended up being.

A new book about the making of the iconic 2015 film by New York Times journalist Kyle Buchanan, titled Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road, reveals Hardy and Armie Hammer were both vying for the role of Max, which was previously portrayed by Mel Gibson.

In an excerpt of his book via Vulture, Buchanan wrote that Hardy, 44, and Hammer, 35, read together for the role as part of their audition. During the reading, Hardy gnashed his teeth and spit at Hammer, per Buchanan’s reporting.

According to the book, Hammer told director George Miller it was Hardy who needed the role more than him.

«Jeremy and Armie were equally wonderful, but there was something about Tom in the room where it felt like that was Max, without a doubt,» Todd Matthew Grossman, who handled the audition camera when Miller was casting, said in the book. «He had that kind of suppressed emotional dryness that you’d find in a post-apocalypse and, buried underneath it, disdain for the world. There was this intensity that burned through the lens.»

Jasin Boland/Warner Bros. Pictures/Everett

Casting director Ronna Kress also spoke about Hardy’s performance, saying, «After Tom auditioned, George and I went into another room, and we had a long moment of quiet with each other. Then I said to George, ‘Is this the person that you can spend nine months in the desert with, telling this story? Is this the person that’s right for you?'»

Miller was also interviewed for the upcoming book, saying, «I had the same feeling about Tom that I had when Mel Gibson first walked into the room: There was a kind of edgy charm, the charisma of animals. You don’t know what’s going on in their inner depths, and yet they’re enormously attractive.»

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Ultimately, the role went to Hardy who recalled feeling «excited to get the job.»

«It’s such a big fish to land that the seesaw effect, the other side of that, was everybody loves Mel as Max and nobody’s gonna want me,» Hardy said. «So it’s like being the new boy at school and set up in some way for failure immediately.»

A prequel film for Fury Road, called Furiosa, is set for release on June 28, 2023, starring Anya Taylor-Joy.