The Hilarious Infinity War Line That Was Dave Bautista Improv
This article contains spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War.
Despite its seriousness, Avengers: Infinity War is at times a pretty lighthearted movie — and in keeping with Marvel Studios tradition, a lot of its best moments are totally improvised.
A new interview with the film's screenwriters from Yahoo Entertainment has shed light on one of Infinity War's biggest laugh-out-loud moments, revealing it to be a clever bit of improv from Dave Bautista, who plays Drax.
According to Christopher Markus, who co-wrote the script for Infinity War with Stephen McFeely, Bautista had a significant addition to the moment the Guardians of the Galaxy meet the outer space-bound Avengers. The former wrestler punched the scene up by throwing an extra quip for Drax at the end of a Iron Man/Star-Lord exchange.
"The script only said, 'Where is Gamora?' 'I'll do you even better: Who is Gamora?'" Markus said. "And then one day Bautista just goes, 'I'll do you one better: Why is Gamora?' It's like, 'OK, you're very good at your job.'"
The hilarious Drax line is just one of the examples from Avengers: Infinity War of an actor elevating what was in the script to something even more resonant.
According to the movie's co-director Joe Russo, Spider-Man actor Tom Holland completely improvised his final scene, after Thanos successfully managed to disintegrate half of all life in the universe.
Thanks to the actor's heartbreakingly realistic performance, his disintegration hit many viewers the hardest of them all — while also inspiring a pretty solid meme.
The improvisation in Infinity War is par for the course for Marvel Studios, which has reportedly produced entire films that are composed mostly of improv.
Jeff Bridges revealed years ago that much of 2008's Iron Man was essentially improvised, telling In Contention, "They had no script, man."
"They had an outline," the actor continued. "We would show up for big scenes every day and we wouldn't know what we were going to say."
The loose approach for that first film wasn't necessarily an accident, as Don Cheadle has said that Iron Man 2 was similarly lacking a locked-in script.
"We were very often sort of on a journey of discovery in the scenes," he said.
While other movies in the MCU have generally had completed scripts, most of them have at times allowed an atmosphere of improvisation.
According to Robert Downey Jr., speaking during an appearance on the Tonight Show, "When you're standing around set for hours, you think of dumb stuff to say, and sometimes you say it when they're rolling."
One of those moments took place in Captain America: Civil War, during Tony Stark's first scene with Peter Parker. According to the movie's official commentary track, Holland forgot the blocking of the scene while they were shooting it, and Downey telling him to "move the leg" was his way of saving the scene while staying in character.
The second movie in the MCU, The Incredible Hulk, also featured an entire scene of improv, with William Hurt saying his post-credit scene as General Ross opposite Tony Stark "had no lines written down."
Each Avengers movie has at least one great little improvised moment. Tony Stark offered Bruce Banner some blueberries because Downey happened to have the snack on set, and Hawkeye's Age of Ultron comment about how easy it would be to shoot Quicksilver was reportedly an on-the-spot creation of Jeremy Renner.
Aside from Iron Man, the most improv-heavy movie in the MCU is likely Thor: Ragnarok, with director Taika Waititi saying "probably 80 percent" of the comic adventure was improvised. According to the film's visual effects supervisor, Waititi specifically wanted interactions between Mark Ruffalo's Hulk and Chris Hemsworth's Thor to be done without a script.
It's an approach that feels risky, but with enough talent in the room (and enough time to kill), it's apparently an approach that works.
Avengers: Infinity War is in theaters now. If the movie's utterly insane box office take is anything to go by, you've probably already seen it.