Screenwriter David Scarpa discusses “manifesting Maximus” in Gladiator 2 25 years later. Watch this new Gladiator 2 featurette for a behind-the-scenes look at the film starring Paul Mescal, Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn, Fred Hechinger, Lior Raz, Derek Jacobi, with Connie Nielsen and Denzel Washington.
Gladiator 2 continues the epic saga of power, intrigue, and vengeance set in Ancient Rome. Years after witnessing the death of the revered hero Maximus at the hands of his uncle, Lucius (Paul Mescal) is forced to enter the Colosseum after his home is conquered by the tyrannical Emperors who now lead Rome with an iron fist. With rage in his heart and the future of the Empire at stake, Lucius must look to his past to find strength and honor to return the glory of Rome to its people.
Gladiator 2 is produced by Douglas Wick, p.g.a., Ridley Scott, p.g.a., Lucy Fisher, p.g.a., Michael Pruss, p.g.a., and David Franzoni. Walter Parkes, Laurie MacDonald, Raymond Kirk, and Aidan Elliott serve as executive producers. Based on characters by David Franzoni. The story is by Peter Craig and David Scarpa. The screenplay is by David Scarpa.
Gladiator 2, directed by Ridley Scott, is now playing in theaters and available to watch at home tomorrow, December 24, 2024.
Gladiator 2 continues the epic saga of power, intrigue, and vengeance set in Ancient Rome. Years after witnessing the death of the revered hero Maximus at the hands of his uncle, Lucius (Paul Mescal) is forced to enter the Colosseum after his home is conquered by the tyrannical Emperors who now lead Rome with an iron fist. With rage in his heart and the future of the Empire at stake, Lucius must look to his past to find strength and honor to return the glory of Rome to its people.
Gladiator 2 is produced by Douglas Wick, p.g.a., Ridley Scott, p.g.a., Lucy Fisher, p.g.a., Michael Pruss, p.g.a., and David Franzoni. Walter Parkes, Laurie MacDonald, Raymond Kirk, and Aidan Elliott serve as executive producers. Based on characters by David Franzoni. The story is by Peter Craig and David Scarpa. The screenplay is by David Scarpa.
Gladiator 2, directed by Ridley Scott, is now playing in theaters and available to watch at home tomorrow, December 24, 2024.
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Short filmTranscript
00:00Writing is the most important entity you can possibly have before beginning anything.
00:08When I started to think about a sequel, I met with David Scarborough and we sat and talked because I had certain parts in my head.
00:16He said, essentially, I'd like you to start writing Gladiator 2, and of course I was really excited.
00:22There was a lot of wrestling with all the specific challenges that go with having a movie that's 25 years later,
00:29having a movie where both the hero and the villain die at the very end.
00:33But the first movie, in its wisdom, teed up this character of Lucius,
00:38and that created the idea of telling the story almost like the Odyssey, in a sense.
00:43The Odyssey takes place many years after the end of the Iliad,
00:47so it's the idea of picking up these characters much further down the road and telling a story from a very different point of view.
00:55The story they came up with, it was brilliant. It speaks to a deep human experience.
01:02The idea that struck me as most interesting is the idea of somebody who has been cast to the wind
01:08and has fled from Rome and been cut off from everything.
01:12We wanted to create this kind of Shakespearean rage within Lucius,
01:16which is the idea that the most bitter thing that he could possibly find upon returning to Rome
01:21is that his mother is with the guy who killed his wife and destroyed his city.
01:26Use your rage in my service, and you will have his head.
01:31It drives him further from Rome, and so it gives him much further to go
01:36when he finally does this 180 over the course of the movie.
01:39The gates of hell are open night and day. We are amused.
01:45We knew we wanted to have these sort of emperor characters that were from history,
01:49but we didn't want to be so direct as to simply redo the first narrative,
01:54and so we chose instead the idea of setting up a bunch of possible nemeses.
01:59Politics follows power.
02:01So a lot of it was about these sort of red herrings or morally ambiguous characters
02:06that might go one way or the other, and then weaving our way towards realizing
02:11that Macrinus is the greatest danger.
02:13Rome must fall. You will be my instrument.
02:17I will never be your instrument in this life or the next.
02:21Mozilla was always the emotional center of it.
02:24It's about these two people are torn apart from one another and how they become reunited.
02:29I think that's a really powerful driver in movies is this idea of having two people
02:35that you know belong together and yet seeing them split apart.
02:39Now that I've found you, I am not afraid.
02:44One of the big questions was how are we going to manifest Maximus in the movie
02:49because even if he's not there on screen, he's there dramatically,
02:53and how do you create his spirit within the movie without actually having him
02:58walking around whispering in Lucia's ear?
03:00Take your father's strength. His name is Maximus, and I see him in you.
03:05Ultimately, we wanted to deliver something that is not the same
03:10and yet is worthy of standing next to the First General.