Jared Leto is known for a lot of things at this point, but one thing that he’s perhaps very known for is his approach to getting in character on-set. Leto is a tried and true method performer, and his turn as the titular program in the upcoming Tron: Ares was no exception to that process.
Which might mean you’re bracing yourself to hear how Leto could possibly have gotten into method acting for playing a digital warrior made up of code that comes from a computerized alt-world. After all, this is the man who hobbled about on crutches during the production of Morbius—to the point of contributing to the film’s production delays—or showed up to the set of Blade Runner 2049 pretending to be blind.
Or, perhaps most infamously, allegedly sent his Suicide Squad castmates animals (living and dead) and used condoms, among other things. So what could Leto have possibly done to maintain his method cred for Tron?
Turns out, it was significantly less weird than you’d expect: he simply forbade people on set from referring to him by name. Instead, it was Ares or nothing (or Air, if you’re Jeff Bridges, according to a recent interview on the Sirius XM show Literally! with Rob Lowe).
“I do address him as Ares when we’re filming and everybody goes, we get a little bit up. He’s the general walking onto set, which is fine,” Ares director Joachim Rønning recently told Screenrant. “And it’s not uncommon for actors to do it like that. And it works for him. And I think you can feel it in any movie he makes. He’s completely into the character.”
According to Rønning, it was the least he could do to help Leto get into the character of an AI supersoldier. “I know he’s a little wary about talking about his [process], I would say it’s his method,” the director continued. “It’s like, yes, he’s in character for the most part when we did this film, but that’s great. Honestly for me as a director, whatever works, I think he’s one of the best actors in the world.”
Still, considering the lengths that Leto has gone to get into a character in the past, simply asking to go by his role’s name means everyone on the Ares set got off lightly.
Tron: Ares is set to hit theaters October 10.
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