Austin Butler has one word to describe the set of Dune: Part Two: hot.
“It was 110 degrees and so hot,” Butler, 32, said of his first day on set during an interview with Entertainment Weekly posted on Wednesday, February 20.
“I had the bald cap on, and it was between two soundstages that were just these gray boxes of 200-foot walls and sand,” he explained. “It became like a microwave. There were people passing out from heat stroke. And that was just my first week.”
Butler’s very first scene on the Dune sequel was a gladiator match involving his character Feyd-Rautha as he battles fighters to prove he should be his uncle’s heir, taking place on Harkonnen’s home planet of Giedi Prime.
“It really bonds the entire crew,” Butler added. “There’s something so humbling about being in such an uncomfortable environment.”
Director Denis Villeneuve, for his part, says the conditions making both Dune and Dune: Part Two were “so harsh” that he and his team were grateful that they split up filming.
“Both movies were made in very harsh conditions, and it’s very physically taxing, so to have a break in between them was a blessing,” the filmmaker told ET. “My first thought was to shoot both movies back to back together, but now I think I would have died. It was really intense, and seeing how the world reacted to ‘Part One’ was a boost of positive energy to go back into the desert.”
When it comes to getting into character, Butler made sure to pay close attention to how Stellan Skarsgård, who plays Baron Harkonnen, spoke in the original Dune movie.
“I felt that because he grew up with the Baron, the Baron would be a big influence on him in many ways,” Butler said of nailing his character’s voice. “So then I started thinking about the way that he speaks, and that being linked to the person that you see with the most power from the time that you’re a child, who you do end up emulating in some way.”
The Golden Globe winner is known for his intensity towards vocal acting. After starring in 2022’s Elvis, the actor made waves for changing his natural voice to one that resembles the King of Rock n’ Roll.
He addressed his tendency to slip into Elvis’s accent in a June 2023 interview with Entertainment Tonight, saying it’s something he “can’t control.”
“At this point, I keep asking people, ‘Is this my voice?’ because this feels like my real … It’s one of those things where certain things trigger it,” he said. “When you live with something for two years and you do nothing else, I think that you can’t help it. It becomes a fiber of your being.”
