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In the latest issue of Esquire, Charlize addressed the rumors that she and Tom Hardy didn't get along on Mad Max: Fury Road.
"We fuckin' went at it, yeah. And on other days, he and George [Miller, the director] went at it. It was the isolation, and the fact that we were stuck in a rig for the entire shoot. We shot a war movie on a moving truck—there's very little green screen. It was like a family road trip that just never went anywhere. We never got anywhere. We just drove. We drove into nothingness, and that was maddening sometimes. And it's material that's really frightening—we didn't have a script. Tom and I are actors who take our jobs seriously. Both of us want to please the directors we work with, and when you don't know if you can deliver on that, it's a frightening place to be—and for Tom more than me, because he was stepping into big shoes. I'd rather have that honesty working with someone than someone who fake-smiles through something—especially for actors, when your job is to go for the emotional truth. When you're with somebody and you don't feel like you're in their emotional truth, then you don't trust them. I think good actors go all the way. If you want to be a safe actor, and you emotionally protect yourself from things getting out of hand, the performance will show all of that. Anyone who really, really, really goes into the deep dark corners of what emotional truth is, as somebody who works opposite of that, you have to be grateful for that. I beg for that. I beg for that on a job, that potency to the stew that makes it that magic that it is. We drove each other crazy, but I think we have respect for each other, and that's the difference. This is the kind of stuff that nobody wants to understand—there's a real beauty to that kind of relationship."
When they finished filming, Tom left her a self-portrait with a red handprint on the back as a gift with the note, "You are an absolute nightmare, BUT you are also fucking awesome. I'll kind of miss you. Love, Tommy."
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