James Gunn hadn’t planned a Clayface movie for his DC universe, but Mike Flanagan’s pitch gave him an unexpected reason to expand it: a horror story Gunn found moving enough to make room for.
“It wasn’t something we anticipated building into the universe, but it was so good and so moving and so touching and unique that we knew we had to do it,” Gunn said.
Flanagan pitched the movie and co-wrote its script, but the production schedule put directing it out of reach. He’d expected Clayface to arrive later in DC’s rollout. His commitments to the Carrie series and his next Exorcist movie meant he needed years before he could take it on, while DC wanted to move ahead.
“I really wanted to do it, too,” Flanagan said. “But they were eager to get it into production and I wasn’t anywhere near available.”
James Watkins took over directing. Tom Rhys Harries stars as Matt Hagen, a Hollywood leading man whose attempt to repair severe disfigurement with a new treatment comes with a deteriorating grip on reality. The character is one of Batman’s best-known adversaries.
Gunn said Harries stood out among the actors who auditioned, winning over both him and Matt Reeves with his acting and charisma.
Harries sees a love story at the center of the horror. “There’s a lot of, like, goop and guts and gore, but I think the film in essence is a romantic film,” he said. “Hopefully, that gore is earned because it only really is effective if [you] care about the characters.”
Flanagan said he’d only seen the trailers and expected he might watch the finished film alongside the public. “That’s James’ movie,” he said of Watkins’ film.
