25 Facts About The 2020 Oscar Best Picture Nominees You Probably Didn’t Know, But 100% Should

1. While promoting Lady Bird, Saoirse Ronan heard that Greta Gerwig was going to direct Little Women, and she immediately told her, “I need to be Jo.”

2. Each of the March sisters in Little Women have a core color palette — Meg is green and lavender, Beth is brown and pink, Amy is light blue, and Jo is red and indigo.

3. Also, throughout Little Women, Jo and Laurie are constantly swapping vests — Greta explained that it symbolized the idea that they were each other’s other half.

4. Greta didn’t give Amy’s big speech about marriage to Florence Pugh until the day they were filming the scene — Meryl Streep actually inspired Greta to write it.

5. In Parasite, in order to flood the neighborhood enough, the set was actually built on top of a large water tank.

6. The melody used for “Jessica, Only Child, Illinois, Chicago” from Parasite is actually a common song in Korea used to help school children memorize things.

7. In Parasite, the second floor of the Park home was created using green/blue screens — the first floor was built on an empty outdoor lot in Jeonju.

8. Robert De Niro first read Charles Brandt’s I Heard You Paint Houses, the book The Irishman is based on, back in 2006 while he was filming The Good Shepherd. He brought it to Martin Scorsese right away.

9. Joe Pesci turned down the role of Russell Bufalino in The Irishman more than 50 times before he decided to accept it.

10. The de-aging processes used in The Irishman were so intricate that the VFX team created 1,750 shots for the movie, which is essentially the equivalent of making two movies.

11. The first draft of Jojo Rabbit actually didn’t include Hitler as Jojo’s imaginary friend. Taika Waititi rewrote the entire script in only a few weeks and decided to turn it into a comedy.

12. It was actually Fox Searchlight’s decision to have Taika play Adolf in the movie — they believed that this particular role “needed to be handled by the person who invented that character.”

13. Before Roman Griffin Davis was found, Taika and the casting directors searched five countries and watched more than 1,000 audition tapes.

14. Joaquin Phoenix lost 52 pounds before filming on Joker began — he explained that he felt it was a way to portray Arthur’s fragility.

15. Joaquin didn’t read the final versions of the Joker script until he arrived in NYC to start filming — he suggested they add a dance at the end, not knowing it was already there.

16. Todd Phillips kept Arthur’s complete journal after filming wrapped on Joker.

17. In Ford v. Ferrari, all of the classic cars were built specifically for the movie — director James Mangold was determined to use as little CGI as possible.

18. When Scarlett Johansson first read the script for Marriage Story, the scene that made her cry the hardest was the shoelace tying moment at the end of the film.

19. While filming the scene where Charlie and Nicole fight in Marriage Story, Adam Driver actually punched through a piece of wood — in between takes, he’d have to ice his hand.

20. Dean-Charles Chapman and George MacKay spent nearly a year immersing themselves into the characters of 1917 before filming even began.

21. While 1917 is edited to look like a single take, the longest take they actually filmed was nine minutes long.

22. Sam Mendes created a second 45-page script for 1917 that solely consisted of maps and diagrams showing where the actors and camera would move and other details.

23. Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio actually did a lot of improvising in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

24. An early version of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood included a moment where Charles Manson and Cliff Booth lock eyes before Manson arrives at Sharon Tate and Roman Polanski’s house.

25. And finally, Quentin Tarantino came up with the final shot in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood four or five years ago, and he always knew that was how the movie would end.

Source: buzzfeed.com