The stars of Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man were like pigs in sh*t when the cameras started rolling – and in some scenes, they literally were.
Steven Knight’s feature film finally arrives on Netflix today (20 March), two weeks after its cinematic release.
Before the finished product appeared on the big screen on 6 March, LADbible sat down with some of the incredible cast and uncovered just how committed they were to getting the perfect shot while shooting in a real-life piggery.
The movie is Barry Keoghan’s first foray into the Peaky Blinders universe, with the Irish actor taking on the role of Tommy Shelby’s unruly son, Duke – and his first day on set was quite the baptism of fire.
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In the explosive scene, Keoghan and Murphy's characters have a brutal row, which ends in fisticuffs. And unfortunately for those involved in it, Steven Knight set this sequence in a pig sty.
And while you'd assume with it being a film it obviously wouldn't be a real sty, the actors ended up wrestling with open wounds in a ‘cesspool’ of actual, very real pig sh*t.
Viewers get to see the two Irish stars tussling in thick mud like a pair of sumo wrestlers - and they were each left caked in the stuff.
Speaking to LADbible, Keoghan revealed that he ended up walking away with some real war wounds after scuffling with Murphy in the muck.
“That was the first day of shooting, straight in,” the 33-year-old said, before revealing that the crew ‘threw cake in at the end, thinking that would make it better’.
By the end of the fight, only his eyes and lips are visible as he’s somewhat face planted in the pig muck.
Reflecting on the battle scars that this dedicated performance left him with, Keoghan said: “I remember actually getting an eye infection.
“And then, my hands – because I actually did punch the ground [for dramatic effect]. So, I’ve got these little scars.”
His co-star Rebecca Ferguson concurred, telling LADbible that Keoghan’s knuckles were left ‘completely bruised’ because he thumped the floor with his fists to rev himself up for the scene.
“There was pig shit going into my scars, into my sores,” Keoghan said with a laugh. “It was a lot!”
“It was a cesspool,” Ferguson added, before Keoghan chimed in: “Yeah, full of sh*t.”
Murphy offered a similar assessment of his first scene with Keoghan, telling LADbible: “It was my first day on set, and it was a whole day of shooting in sh*t.
“The costumes weighed as much as we did, or more. But it looked good.”
Film legend Tim Roth, who stars as the antagonist in Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man, pointed out that the pigs who starred alongside them did a lot of ‘sh*tting’.
“The pig sh*t thing was interesting, because I was in with the pigs before [Murphy] was. They tried to clear a thing for him and build an area, but I think it might have been slightly invaded…
“I had to do a scene [in the piggery] with Barry and that was my first day. I remember just watching the pigs walking around, sh*tting and p*ssing. There’s a lot, they can carry a lot. It was very funny.”
Prior to getting stuck in to filming, Keoghan told us that - like a lot of fans who needed a refresher on what went down during the six seasons - he mused back through some of the action-packed 36 episodes on Netflix.
However, the father-of-one explained that to avoid becoming a caricature or cliché of the budding Birmingham gangster he was portraying, he ‘tried not to’ focus on the series too much.
“That puts a bit of pressure on, going back and watching stuff,” Keoghan said. “So I sort of try to stay away from that kind of thing and bring my own twist to it.”
Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man is available to stream on Netflix now.
Topics: Peaky Blinders, Film, Netflix, Cillian Murphy, Barry Keoghan, Celebrity, Originals
Olivia Burke