How Austin Butler and Tom Cruise inspired Timothée Chalamet for Dune: Part Two

Dune was one of the biggest movies of 2021, a thinking man’s blockbuster adapted from Frank Herbert’s influential 1965 novel. It also featured so many stars the night sky must be empty. Timothée Chalamet played lead character Paul Atreides, Oscar Isaac his father Duke Leto, Javier Bardem the Fremen leader Stilgar, Zendaya the Fremen warrior Chani, Jason Momoa as Paul’s fighting instructor Duncan Idaho, Stellan Skarsgård as the villainous Baron Harkonnen, and more.

And that will continue in Dune: Part Two, as Christopher Walken joins the cast of the emperor of the galaxy, Florence Pugh joins as his daughter Princess Irulan, and Elvis star Austin Butler comes aboard as Baron Harkonnen’s nephew Feyd Rautha, who is just as vicious as his uncle.

Speaking to GQ, Chalamet talked about how inspired he was by Butler’s commitment to his role. “I can’t overstate how inspiring it was to me personally,” he said. “Because here was someone who’s a little older than me, but generationally we’re similar, and I don’t know how he would put it, but his journey was different than mine. But he takes the work incredibly seriously. And I feel like I hadn’t seen that among someone my age, whether it was in drama school or on set, that did take the work that seriously but then after ‘cut’ wasn’t, you know, in some show of how seriously they took it—and instead is this tremendously affable, wonderful man.”

Chalamet wasn’t the only cast member impressed by Butler’s ability to disappear into a villainous role without letting that spill over into their personality once the cameras stopped rolling. Stephen McKinley Henderson, who plays the mentat Thufir Hawat, had nothing but praise for Butler when he went on the This Is Purdue podcast. “[Austin] played a character that was not very happy with me at all, and he was quite chilling, and I was giving him back the looks, but when they say, ‘Cut,’ he would come over and say, ‘Mr. Henderson, are you okay? Can I help you? Can I get you anything?’ And he was just so nice. And then we’d go back to roll and he went, ‘Ugh.’ He was on my case. So I just so appreciated Austin, a wonderful, wonderful person.”

Dune: Part Two will likely climax with a fight between Paul and Feyd, so we’ll see two of Hollywood’s brightest young stars light up the screen. “You’re talking about two of the most talented young actors of our generation facing off,” said producer Cale Boyter. “I would say Timmy’s level of preparation going into the scene—well, knowing he was fighting Austin enhanced it.”

When Tom Holland visited the set of Dune: Part Two

Chalamet also got some encouragement from a seemingly unlikely source: Tom Cruise, who’s been a movie star for decades. “He basically said, in Old Hollywood, you would be getting dance training and fight training, and nobody is going to hold you to that standard today. So it’s up to you,” Chalamet recalled. Cruise even recommended people Chalamet could turn to for stunt training.

This sent Chalamet into overdrive. He devoted himself to training and watched Tom Cruise’s movie Top Gun: Maverick eighth times for good measure. “Top Gun was just hugely inspiring to me last summer when we were making Dune,” Chalamet said. “Some of the crew were kind of scoffing at going, but I just thought it was one of the greatest films I’ve ever seen.”

All that training seemed to pay off, at least according to director Denis Villeneuve. “It was the first time that I witnessed someone growing in front of my camera,” he said. And when Cruise nor Butler nor Villeneuve were around to inspire him, Chalamet could always turn to talented costars like Pugh or Zendaya, or Zendaya’s boyfriend Tom Holland, who visited the set:

"It was so incredibly valuable to spend so much time with Zendaya and her assistant, Darnell, and when Tom would come to set too. They’re level. They’re good Hollywood. They’re good-energy Hollywood. And then Austin and Florence. I feel like I’m creating a community for myself of people who care about the right things."

There’s been a lot of talk lately about the concept of the movie star is fading. If anything is gonna bring it back, it’ll be a movie like Dune: Part Two.

Director of Sci-Fi Channel Dune miniseries “very excited” for Dune: Part Two

Shifting away from actors, let’s talk about something else essential for a movie set on a desert planet: sand. “For my mise-en-scène, I’ll want a particular shaped dune,” Villeneuve told Empire. “But Greig Fraser, on the other hand, will need that same shape to be in a specific light. So Patrice spent weeks and weeks casting sand dunes in the desert! We looked like madmen.”

"I still find it every morning in my shoes,” winces the director. “We’re sand-traumatised, for sure."

Meanwhile, other people who have worked on the Dune universe in years past are excited to see the new movie. That includes director John Harrison, who directed the miniseries Frank Herbert’s Dune and Frank Herbert’s Children of Dune for the Sci-Fi Channel back in the early ’00s. “I’m very excited about it,” Harrison told ComicBook.com. “Richard Rubenstein and I were still involved in the development of several attempts to try and get it off the ground after my miniseries. And maybe fortunately, some of those never came to pass because I think what Denis Villeneuve has done is just fantastic. And I love him as a director. I wasn’t involved at all in the latest movies except to have my name put up there. But I think it’s just fantastic and I’m really looking forward to the new ones.”

"And I hope it does introduce a whole new audience to the Dune world. If they are able to get back and see my miniseries, I’m very proud of them. We were able to … I think the success of them, they won a couple of Emmys and they were hugely successful here and abroad. I think they gave people faith that Dune actually could be adapted again."

Dune: Part Two is scheduled to come out on March 15, 2024.

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