Bad Bunny's Best Acting Role Yet Hyped By Darren Aronofsky: "He Disappeared"

Darren Aronofsky’s latest film is Caught Stealing, a crime thriller that presents itself like a very different type of project for the beloved director. While Aronofsky is known for darker, often challenging works such as Requiem for a Dream, The Whale, and Black Swan, Caught Stealing looks to be a lighter, faster-paced effort.

The movie, based on a book of the same name by Charlie Huston, tells the story of Hank Thompson, who finds himself at odds with the criminal underbelly of 1990’s New York City after agreeing to watch his neighbor’s cat. It stars Austin Butler, Zoë Kravitz, Matt Smith, and Bad Bunny, all of whom appear in the Caught Stealing trailer.

ScreenRant’s Liam Crowley interviewed Aronofsky about his work on Caught Stealing. The director explained why singer, actor, and wrestler Bad Bunny is particularly proud of his performance, what audiences might gain from paying close attention to his directorial choices, and more. Caught Stealing comes to theaters on August 29.

Why Bad Bunny Loved Acting In Caught Stealing

Bad Bunny has begun to become known for his willingness to throw himself into acting roles, from Bullet Train to memorable appearances on Saturday Night Live. But Darren Aronofsky revealed that Caught Stealing may have been the actor’s most consequential role yet, at least in the popstar’s own opinion.

“He saw the film for the first time last week,” Aronofsky shared, “and for me, the personal compliment is [that] he felt like it was the first character where he disappeared. It wasn’t necessarily him there; it was a character.”

The filmmaker also reflected on the actual experience of working with the singer, saying “he was very serious and he was very committed, and not a diva in any way.”

There were particular considerations when shooting, though, Aronofsky revealed: “We were shooting night scenes, stuck in a bar on a Friday, Saturday night, so having him go out into the street was probably a bad idea.” Luckily for the filmmaker, “He was willing to fully just hang out and chill and become part of the team.”

Why You Should Pay Attention To Aronofsky’s Every Move In His New Movie

Austin Butler as Hank holding a baseball bat and looking scared in Caught Stealing

Darren Aronofsky is known for having very specific visions, and Caught Stealing is no exception. When asked about his camerawork in the movie, the director reflected on one particular sequence involving Austin Butler’s character Hank Thompson.

“From when he takes the first drink,” he said of the character, “the camera’s pulling out of every single shot through that whole sequence until the drunk sequence is over. It’s not just one shot; the whole idea was to pull away and retreat away from him. That allowed us to feel the separation from him as a person.”

Moves like that are part of a larger methodology. “I have a mentor who would always tell me, ‘Grammatically, there’s only one place to stick the camera,’ and that’s something I always search for. When actors perform what’s in front of me for the scene, we slowly start to think about how the camera’s going to help tell the story.”

How Caught Stealing’s Unique Musical World Came Together

Austin Butler as Hank and Matt Smith as Russ walking down a hallway in a storage facility in Caught Stealing

Music, while key to most films, is especially important to the character of Caught Stealing. “There’s tons of great needle drops in the film because it’s 1998 in New York, and there’s all different types of music from electronic to pop to rock, but I always felt like the film would really benefit from a house band,” Aronofsky shared.

For that, the director turned to Idles, a post-punk band he is a fan of. “They wrote a bunch of songs for the movie that are all through the chase scenes and the action scenes in the film.” When that wasn’t enough to match all of the beats in Caught Stealing, Aronofsky called up a frequent collaborator.

“I needed, also, a score,” he said, “and I went back to Rob Simonsen who worked with me on The Whale and Postcard from Earth and together we started to dream up a score that he wrote.”

But the music evolved one final time, Aronofsky said: “Then we had this idea, ‘What if The Idles actually perform [the score]? And so every piece of music that’s not a needle drop is from Idles.”

You can watch Caught Stealing in theaters beginning August 29.