By now, if you've seen Bohemian Rhapsody, you already know the physical transformation Rami Malek went through to take on Freddie Mercury's notable teeth, strut and more. If you haven't seen the movie yet, you probably still heard about it. Regardless, it was way more complicated than you might think to do the role, as Rami Malek recently revealed he was learning to do Freddie while also filming his role as Elliot Alderson on Mr. Robot. He said in a recent interview:
But here's the other thing: I also had to go shoot the third season of Mr. Robot during all of that, which was quite a daunting task. I actually found a picture of Elliot Alderson with the teeth of Freddie Mercury the other day and it kind of made my brain explode.
Freddie Mercury was a larger-than-life singer who had his own way of walking, talking, moving and certainly singing. Elliot, on the other hand is a genius mastermind who has trouble making eye contact and really engaging with certain parts of the world at large. At one point on set, Rami Malek was switching back and forth between playing Elliot and practicing for Freddie so much that there's an image sort of morphing the two, an image I would desperately love to see.
Having to switch back and forth between roles couldn't have been easy, but the actor did reveal he tried to make the best of the situation when it was happening.
Rami Malek also told THR that there was another moment of crossover between Elliot and Freddie on the set of Mr. Robot. Just when the show was wrapping and Bohemian Rhapsody was about to start filming, the Mr. Robot showrunner had Malek bring a little Freddie onto set. Per Malek:
One cool thing, when we had wrapped season three of Mr. Robot, they knew within two weeks I was going to start shooting. [Showrunner] Sam Esmail says, 'Give me something.' So as we wrapped that day, I did a little spin in my hoodie and flipped my leg up in the air like a dancer. The whole crew erupted in laughter because they've never seen that out of Elliot.
It's been clear over the past several years that Rami Malek is an extremely versatile performer and if you haven't gotten a chance to see him on the USA series, the show is coming back for Season 4, although that will mark the end of the series.
On the film side of things, Rami Malek is next set to appear in The Voyage of Doctor Dolittle, voicing Chee-Chee, a character in Hugh Lofting's literary universe who is a monkey and who previously appeared in the 1967 film.
Mr. Robot will return in 2019. Bohemian Rhapsody is in theaters now.
