When HBO Max announced its first original film was the Seth Rogen comedy An American Pickle, few would have guessed it would also double as a special effects bonanza. But double it did, with twin Seths playing two men named Greenbaum separated by 100 years in an enormous, stasis-inducing pickle vat. (Just go with it.)
Split-screens are such a common camera trick that it hardly even registers, but as this newly released behind-the-scenes video makes clear, there’s one aspect of movie magic that hasn’t quite been perfected: fake beards.
“I refused to wear a fake beard or a wig at any point in the movie, because I watch the most expensive movies on earth and they still have terrible beards,” Rogen told Entertainment Weekly in a recent interview. “I just knew that there would be no way to reconcile it, they simply look bad.”
With this facial hair hurdle in place, it made for some challenges. The film couldn’t rely on the usual dance with stand-ins and cropped frames. It meant Pickle’s director Brandon Trost and the entire crew effectively shot the movie twice. First with a hirsute Rogen, and then returning to the locations with a shaved (well, a slacker-ish millennial’s version of shaved) Rogen ready for the other half of the scene. There’s no computer program that can top patience!
This fun video released Friday looks at An American Pickle’s flavorful technique.
Where to Watch An American Pickle:
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