Director Ridley Scott and the film's stars open up on how they managed the last minute switch in time for the film's planned December release.
In the wake of the allegations of sexual misconduct against Kevin Spacey, Ridley Scott had to quickly reshoot and re-edit Spacey's role as J. Paul Getty in All The Money in the World -- with Christopher Plummer taking over the part.
Scott, Plummer, and some of the cast, including Mark Wahlberg and Michelle Williams, sat down with ET's Kevin Frazier at the film's junket on Sunday to reveal how they pulled off the whirlwind switch, and why Scott was immediately on board with the idea.
The Alien: Convenant director said he recognized a shift in the Hollywood landscape as soon as the Harvey Weinstein allegations came out, and decided when accusations against Spacey were revealed, he had to move fast.
"I knew as soon as they hit Kevin it was going to blow wide open and I contacted my partners and said, 'We should recast this right now. We shoot right now, we'll be out the same day,'" Scott said of the decision.
"Within 36 hours, I knew what I was going to do," he revealed.
Scott contacted Plummer, who met with the director in New York, where they made a deal. "Once I got his agreement, everything else was a matter of efficiency," Scott said of the swift turnaround, which included a new trailer featuring Plummer debuting weeks after the announcement. "I got a really efficient group."
Plummer wanted to work with Scott almost immediately, even though he hadn't gotten a chance to even read the script before their meeting.
"I really would have said yes anyway if I hadn't read it, because I wanted to work with him very much," the Academy Award-winning actor noted. "I did read it, and said yes, and boom we were off to the races."
Williams, who plays Gail Harris, mother to the kidnapped John Paul Getty III, was an admirer of Plummer, and was excited to work with him when he stepped into the part.
"To have him accept being a part of our film, I was over the moon," the actress said.
However, she also admitted that shooting the scenes with Plummer as Getty was a bit restrictive, seeing as the majority of the film had already been completed.
"There wasn't a tremendous amount of freedom in order to change things, because things had to be slotted in pretty carefully," the 37-year-old actress said. "This movie [was turned] around in three days. It wasn't like you could sort of radically adjust and decide to jump on a table, or you now wear a different suit or something."
Wahlberg revealed that not only the reshoots, but the original filming of the All the Money in the World interrupted his family's plans after he had just finished filming Daddy's Home 2.
"For me, the movie as a whole was always kind of one kind of crazy thing after another," he said of being cast in the biopic. "We had a lot of summer plans, so I had to go to my wife and get permission to go make this movie."
When Scott approached Wahlberg about the reshoots, he was just about to start filming another movie and had to interrupt his Thanksgiving plans as well. But when the director explained that he wanted to show respect to everyone who had worked hard on the movie, as well as Spacey's alleged victims, Wahlberg made it happen.
"You have all these artists that worked on this movie and he wanted to make sure that their work was seen," Wahlberg said. "And so he said he was gonna reshoot the movie, so I said OK, we'll cancel Thanksgiving and tell Pete [Berg] we'll rehearse after we start shooting the movie."
Wahlberg and Plummer hadn't even met at all prior to filming together, adding an interesting wrinkle to their shred scenes.
"I walked on the set and I met Chris that day," Wahlberg revealed. "He was already in wardrobe and makeup in front of the camera. We said hello literally in front of the camera as Ridley was saying rolling and we started shooting."
It seems all the reshuffling and last minute arrangements paid off, as Plummer was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance last week, along with co-star Williams and Scott for Best Director.
"I find it quite extraordinary. I haven't seen it yet and I'm nominated," Plummer said.
"I don't know what he's done. He may have cut my performance completely out of the film, I don't know," he added with a laugh. "I'm going to see it tomorrow night. I'm thrilled and pleased. It's wild."
Scott even joked about the nominations and recognition from his directing peers, saying, "We pretend we're not competitive, but we are, so when you get the vote it's very nice."
All the Money in the World is in theaters Dec. 25. For more on the film, watch the video below.
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