Brendan Fraser receives 6-minute standing ovation, breaks down in tears

THE Venice premiere of Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale was met with a 6-minute long standing ovation for lead actor Brendan Fraser, who ended up in tears following the huge reception. Fraser plays a 600-pound gay man confined to a wheelchair, and his performance is already generating buzz that he is a likely frontrunner for this year’s best actor Oscars race. 

Joining him at the festival is director Aronofsky and supporting actor Sadie Sink, one of the breakout stars of Stranger Things. They were seen joining in the applause and cheering on for Fraser. Other guests seated among the audience at the Sala Grande Theatre were Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Nick Kroll, and Hillary Clinton staffer Huma Abedin.  

The Whale stars Fraser as a man living with severe obesity, struggling to reconnect with his 17-year-old daughter, played by Sink. The supporting cast includes Hong Chau, Samantha Morton and Ty Simpkins. The movie is based on the play of the same name by Samuel D. Hunter, who also adapted the material into the screenplay. 

To embody the role, Fraser had to put on a prosthetic suit that added anywhere from 50 to 300 pounds, depending on the requirements of the scene. The actor spent up to six hours in the makeup chair daily to transform into the character. In an interview, Fraser shared that his prosthetic suit was “cumbersome, not exactly comfortable,” adding, “The torso piece was almost like a straight jacket with sleeves that went on, airbrushed by hand, to look identical as would human skin, right down to the hand-punched hair.” 

“I developed muscles I did not know I had,” Fraser told journalists at the Venice press conference about wearing the prosthetic suit. “I even felt a sense of vertigo at the end of the day when all the appliances were removed; it was like stepping off the dock onto a boat in Venice. That [sense of] undulating. It gave me appreciation for those whose bodies are similar. You need to be an incredibly strong person, mentally and physically, to inhabit that physical being.” 

Fraser became an action star with 1997’s George of the Jungle and the box office franchise The Mummy, but dropped out of the limelight after he was allegedly sexually assaulted by HFPA ex-president Philip Berk.

Although Fraser had a supporting role in Steven Soderbergh’s No Sudden Move last year, The Whale marks a comeback for the actor in his first starring role in a film since 2013’s direct-to-DVD action movie Breakout. Fraser can be next seen in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, set for likely release next year. His performance as Garfield Lynns/Firefly in the supposed DC Comics tentpole Batgirl will unfortunately never see the light of day as Warner Bros announced the cancellation of the film’s release. 

The Whale premieres in theaters in selected markets on December 9, 2022. – The Vibes, September 5, 2022