Josh Brolin says he nearly walked off Ridley Scott’s The Dog Stars after a single day of shooting, unsettled by a directing style he had not seen even during an earlier collaboration with Scott.
Brolin arrived on set in Italy last spring fresh off a run of back-to-back productions, including Weapons, Wake Up Dead Man and The Running Man. He expected the rhythm he remembered from American Gangster, the 2007 film that first paired him with Scott. Instead he found a director skipping traditional rehearsal in favor of talking through scenes and rolling cameras almost immediately.
The shift rattled him enough that he left set, called his agent, and said he wanted off the project, convinced something had gone badly wrong. His agent suggested he sleep on it, but Brolin pushed back, certain his instinct wasn’t the kind that would fade overnight.
What changed his mind, he told Empire, was Scott pulling him into a trailer to watch playback of a scene he had just shot opposite Jacob Elordi. Seeing the footage land gave him enough confidence to stay, and within a couple of days he had adjusted to Scott’s approach, describing it as thrilling and unpredictable in equal measure. He called the shoot one of the more creatively rewarding experiences of his career, precisely because it offered him none of the comfort he had grown used to on other sets.
The film casts Brolin as Bruce Bangley, a gun-carrying neighbor, opposite Elordi’s grief-stricken pilot navigating a wilderness emptied by a deadly flu pandemic. Margaret Qualley, Guy Pearce, Benedict Wong and Allison Janney round out the cast. Scott produced alongside Scott Free’s Michael Pruss, with a screenplay by Mark L. Smith adapted from Peter Heller’s novel.
Brolin’s account fits a broader conversation about how Scott now works. Cinematographer John Mathieson, a frequent collaborator, said in late 2024 that the director had grown impatient and rushed on set, criticism that coincided with the end of their partnership. Brolin’s experience suggests a director whose speed can unsettle collaborators before it wins them over.
The Dog Stars opens in U.S. theaters August 28.
