Mark Romanek has insisted Keira Knightley is "utterly spectacular" to work with.
Keira Knightley
Knightley was slammed over the weekend by her 'Begin Again' director John Carney for having a huge "entourage" and distancing herself on set of the movie, but a number of her previous collaborators have taken to social media to rubbish his claims and defend her reputation.
The drama kicked off when Carney gave an interview about his new movie 'Sing Street', but turned the conversation around to 'Begin Again' - which also starred Mark Ruffalo and Adam Levine and was based on musicians trying to crack America.
Asked how he felt about Sing Street's rave reviews, he said: "It's fantastic. I'm very surprised; it's a small personal movie with no 'Keira Knightleys' in it."
And he didn't stop there.
Asked why he enjoyed making 'Sing Street' in his native Ireland, he said he was delighted to get away from the fandom that surrounded Knightley.
He said: "I had just come back from making this far bigger movie in America... I was a bit disenchanted with working with certain movie stars in that movie and I wanted a break. I didn't enjoy that experience of paparazzi and fabulous openings.... Keira has an entourage that follow her everywhere so it's very hard to get any real work done."
He then went on to criticise her performance in the movie, saying she was more of a "supermodel" than actress.
He added: "I think the real problem was that Keira wasn't a singer and wasn't a guitar player and it's very hard to make music seem real if it's not with musicians. And I think the audience struggled a little bit with that in 'Begin Again'. And as much as I tried to make it work I think that she didn't quite come out as a guitar-playing singer-songwriter. So I really wanted to work with musicians and actors that could play their instruments properly and sing and stuff like that.
"I learned that I'll never make a film with supermodels again."
Carney then praised Ruffalo and Levine for being wonderful to work with and said that Knightely tended to "hide" on set.
He said: "Mark Ruffalo is a fantastic actor and Adam Levine is a joy to work with and actually quite unpretentious and not a bit scared of exposing himself on camera and exploring who he is as an individual. I think that that's what you need as an actor; you need to not be afraid to find out who you really are when the camera's rolling. Keira's thing is to hide who you are and I don't think you can be an actor and do that.
He said: "So it's not like I hate the Hollywood thing but I like to work with curious, proper film actors as opposed to movie stars. I don't want to rubbish Keira, but you know it's hard being a film actor and it requires a certain level of honesty and self-analysis that I don't think she's ready for yet and I certainly don't think she was ready for on that film."
However, Keira's director on 'Never Let Me Go' has claimed Carney's comments are completely fabricated.
Romanek said: "My experience with #keiraknightley was utterly spectacular on every level. I have no clue what this guy is talking about. #arrogants***head.
"My recollection of #keiraknightley's "entourage" was that her mum visited the set one day for an hour or two."
And Lorene Scafaria, who was behind the camera on the actress' 2012 comedy-drama 'Seeking A Friend For The End Of The World' also stood up for the actress.
She said: "I agree with Mark. Keira was a joy to work w/. Present & easy & really, really good at her job. Just lovely.(sic)"
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