There are a lot of pivotal movie scenes that really require thespians to crank up the waterworks
and send home the emotion of the moment.
So, how do these stars manage to trickle out those tears again and again with each take?
Let's take a look at how some of Hollywood's finest make it happen.
It may not be common, but there are some actors who have the ability to summon up authentic
sobs by sheer force of will, and lots of practice.
Bryce Dallas Howard famously demonstrated her natural gift for crying on command during
an interview with Conan O'Brien, shedding tears while listening to the talk show host
tell a nonsensical story about the variety of duct tape at Home Depot:
"Duct tape.
All kinds of duct tape.
You can get grey duct tape."
"Yeah."
"You do this incredible thing.
You give so much and you get so little in return."
"I know."
The actress later returned to the same show and revealed that her teary talent is far
from genetic.
"It’s technical."
"It's technical"
"It’s something that can be learned, and taught, and you just need to give me a little
bit of money…"
"Right."
"... and I’ll give you all the secrets."
According to Howard, inducing the soft palate lift that comes with yawning again and again
is key in helping her produce those crocodile tears.
The actress revealed:
"You do it enough time and when you're talking you can continue to lift it.
It triggers it, just talking about it for me, it's like a physiological thing."
Howard also added that the biggest key to crying on cue is making sure to stay completely
hydrated so there's plenty of H2O to spare in her system.
Amy Adams can also turn on the sprinklers at a moment's notice, but instead of relying
on a physical trick, the actress claims that she uses quite a spicy memory to make the
waterworks happen.
Adams told Jimmy Fallon that her daughter helped coax her into crying on cue by telling
her about a Sriracha plant in California that was shuttered after neighboring residents
complained about the fumes coming from the production facility.
"I really like Sriracha.
And, umm, I don't know if you heard, but they were thinking of closing the… the plant."
Okay, maybe it was a put on.
But just try and name a bigger Sriracha fan, we dare you!
Anna Faris revealed to late-night host James Corden that she isn't the type of person who
can easily sob in real life, meaning it's that much more difficult for her to cry on
camera.
The actress said:
"It's actually… a little bit weird.
If I ever cried in my personal life, [my mom] would sort of come down on me, like, 'What
do you have to feel sorry for?'”
So, instead of trying to power through with real tears, Faris relies on a device called
a tear stick.
Faris, Corden, and fellow guest Josh Jackson each agreed to have the menthol crystal vapors
blown into their eyes to demonstrate for the crowd, and within seconds, they were each
dripping with tears.
That's when Jackson revealed the secondary trick to selling these fake tears on-screen:
"Now look three-quarters away and slightly up."
"Yeah."
Nailed it.
Some actors don't have to stretch their minds too far to work up the requisite tears for
a tough scene.
Daniel Kaluuya revealed that while filming the stand-out "Sunken Place" scene for Jordan
Peele's Get Out, in which his character was physically frozen in fear, he simply thought
about what it would be like to be in a similar situation in real life.
In an “Actors on Actors” chat for Variety, Kaluuya explained that a large part of tapping
into that headspace to cry involved recognizing the parallels between his character's situation
and everyday scenarios, saying:
"It's just empathizing with someone that's going through so much and has suppressed it,
kind of suppressed his guilt of a really bad situation and shame.
And also his reluctance to face it.
He's paralyzed, he's paralyzed emotionally.
And I identified with that in all walks of life.”
And thus, an unforgettable cinematic crying scene was born.
"Now you're in the sunken place."
Empathy is a valuable trait and certainly helpful in crying on cue, but if an actor
has his or her own harrowing life experience to help bring the sad sobs to the set, it's
even better.
For one of his first films after his Harry Potter days, Daniel Radcliffe starred as the
beat poet Allen Ginsberg in the biographical drama-thriller Kill Your Darlings.
The role required Radcliffe to shed a lot of tears, something that wasn’t exactly
easy for the actor to do.
Radcliffe told the Vancouver Sun:
"Unless you have that trick of being able to cry on cue, which some people can do, the
more you try to force it, the more awkward and awful it becomes… as I have found!"
Unfortunately, there’s no magic spell to summon tears.
However, Radcliffe revealed that he revisited a helpful pointer from Gary Oldman to help
him turn on the waterworks.
The actor said his former on-screen godfather once told him:
"Don't be afraid to use all your own stuff because they're only going to see it happening
to the character."
"You weren't gonna tell me?"
"We both know why you can't come."
Radcliffe didn't share what memory did the trick exactly, but revealed that he did find
some success with it, saying:
"Three uncontrollable, breaking-down scenes later… there were these real, raw tears.
The first time that happens to you on a set full of people… even if you go in just as
that character, at that moment, it is just you.”
Now, that’s a magical moment if we’ve ever heard one.
Without a built-in trick or handy dandy device to help bring on the waterworks, some actors
just have to jump into an emotional scene feet first and hope their eyes catch up somewhere
along the way.
Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence revealed that for one of her big crying scenes, she actually
went through the bodily motions of mourning, and the tears happened to follow suit.
The actress told MTV News:
"I can definitely start [sobbing] and water comes, sometimes.
I don't have anything in my life that can instantly make me cry.
It's mostly just the standard, hold your eyes open, fake your way through it."
Lawrence later elaborated that she needs to widen her eyes for a "long time" to make her
method work, but that it’s still her go-to for the gushy scenes.
Considering how stacked her trophy shelf is right about now, whatever she's doing is obviously
working just fine.
Will Smith might have no trouble serving up serious drama now that he's such a seasoned
film star, but back in his earliest days on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Smith was still
learning how to emote on camera.
His starring sitcom role almost always relied on his skill for being suave and self-assured,
but there was one important moment in the show's fourth season that required the actor
to really dig deep.
In the poignant episode, Will's father returns to his life and gives the teen hope that he
might finally forge a bond with the man who's been M.I.A. throughout his upbringing.
However, he doesn’t stick around for long, and Will delivers a heartbreaking monologue
that vacillates between contempt, determination, and a lot of hurt.
"How come he don’t want me, man?"
Without a strong delivery by Smith, the scene might've been hokey, but he sold his sadness
thanks to the help of his on-screen uncle, James Avery.
Smith revealed:
"James Avery was relentlessly on me to elevate.
He was like, 'You have this position, look where you are, look what you are blessed with.'
He was like, 'I'm sorry but I'm not accepting anything other than absolute committed perfection
from you.'"
Hollywood history is filled with stories of filmmakers using near-torturous techniques
to elicit an emotional response from their stars, like when Alfred Hitchcock tormented
Tippi Hedren on the set of The Birds to capture real fear or when Stanley Kubrick made Shelley
Duvall unwell with his harsh demands on the set of The Shining, and her condition conveniently
aligned with her character's.
"I'm very confused…
I just need a chance to think things over."
Similarly, there have been several noteworthy cases of cast members being coerced into crying
on-set by some of their co-workers, whether they liked it or not.
For example, when he was still a child star, Jackie Cooper was bullied by director Norman
Taurog into bringing it with his tears in Skippy.
Though the role earned the then-nine-year-old an Oscar nomination, it’s safe to say that
Taurog’s threat to kill Cooper’s dog if the actor didn’t cry took things a bit too
far.
Similarly, Francis Ford Coppola reportedly resorted to calling Winona Ryder vicious names
to bring her to tears on the set of Bram Stoker's Dracula.
There are some actors so talented that they simply don’t have a need to turn to methods
or manufacturing when they’re called to be emotionally affected in a scene.
In a surprise to no one, Meryl Streep, largely considered the greatest actress of our time,
is one of those skilled few.
In a discussion with the students at the University of Texas, Streep revealed that her process
is simply to power through whatever challenge she faces, including bringing tears to the
table even when she isn't actually in the mopey mood.
The actress said:
"The hardest thing to do is to do something when you don't feel it.
It's weird and hard to do what isn't really happening and make it like it is.
But we need actors.
We need them to help us understand different emotions and realities.
To console us.
To let us know that we're not alone."
In other words, whenever Streep needs to cry on screen, she simply remembers how important
it is for Meryl Streep to cry on screen, and she gets the job done.
That kind of gumption just can't be taught, so it's no wonder she's so many light-years
ahead of the rest.
Oprah Winfrey seems to be good at everything, but when the TV mogul does occasionally dip
her toes into the waters of Hollywood to star in a movie, it's not always easy for her.
In fact, Winfrey told Larry King that before she earned an Academy Award nomination for
her work in The Color Purple, she felt like a failure because she could only cry when
the cameras were pointed elsewhere during production.
As soon as they were facing her, the tears were nowhere to be found.
"So all night long I cried, because I couldn’t cry."
Winfrey later revealed that before she began working on Lee Daniels' The Butler, she decided
to bring in some help and learn how to fake some of that raw emotion that came so easily
on her daytime talk show.
Winfrey said:
"Everybody thinks that I'm a good crier, an easy crier.
I can cry if I'm in the moment and feeling emotion, but as an actress, that was one of
my biggest fears.”
Thanks to the enlistment of an acting coach, Winfrey said she figured out how to make herself
cry in just 20 minutes.
Now, that’s something to jump up and down about.
The late, great Shirley Temple might have been just a tiny tyke when she became a legend
of the early screen scene, but even then she was a consummate professional.
In a 1999 interview the former child superstar revealed her method for breaking out with
a wail on camera, saying:
"I guess I was an early method actress.
I would go to a quiet part of the soundstage with my mother.
I wouldn't think of anything sad, I would just make my mind a blank.
In a minute I could cry."
Temple did have one crying caveat, though.
The Hollywood legend said she didn’t like to cry after lunch, because she was too content.
Who can be sad after chowing down on animal crackers in their soup?
Check out one of our newest videos right here!
Plus, even more Looper videos about your favorite movie stars are coming soon.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel, and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one.