Bradley Cooper’s Oscar campaign for Maestro is just as over-the-top as his campaign for A Star Is Born back in 2018-19. If anything, I’m sort of more offended this time around, given Cooper’s insistence on casting and directing himself as Leonard Bernstein, complete with a comically offensive prosthetic nose. Not only that, but Bradley Cooper is bragging about his “set rules” as a director and they’re completely awful.

Bradley Cooper has a unique set of rules while he’s directing, including “no chairs” on set.

“For me, it was such a natural transition, once I had the courage to write and direct a movie. But when I direct, I don’t watch playback. There’s no chairs,” Cooper, 48, told Spike Lee about filming Maestro in an interview for Variety published on Wednesday, December 14. “I’ve always hated chairs on sets; your energy dips the minute you sit down in a chair.”

Considering filming can typically consist of 12 to 16-hour days, Cooper’s commitment to keeping his actors in the moment certainly seems intense, which he understands. He admitted he “changed” during the process of filming, and he wasn’t surprised if his film wasn’t loved by all viewers.

“I will say this about Maestro: I grew up on this movie,” he continued. “It changed me as an artist. And people may not like it. I’m sure they won’t.

In addition to no chairs, the American Hustle actor also noted that “there’s no video village” on set, which alludes to him doing away with the monitors that usually surround the director while filming.

[From Us Weekly]

*looks at that fake nose again* Maybe if he was watching scenes as he was filming them in a video village, he would have seen that the prosthetics weren’t working? Seriously, I’ve heard bad things about directors who don’t leave the video village and I’m sure that’s a problem too, but you’re literally directing a film and you want to see if the setup works and you want to foster collaboration with your cinematographer, director of photography, etc. “No video villages” isn’t a flex.

As for no sitting… I usually don’t go to “that’s ableism,” but it is. Not every person is physically capable of standing for hours. It’s also not a moral failing for actors or workers to want to sit down in between scenes or setups. It also seems like not allowing seats on set would be a huge legal liability. What if someone faints, etc. Bradley Cooper sounds like such a f–king douche.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, screencap from ‘Maestro’ trailer.