Austin Butler Says His ‘Dune’ Acting Process Was Very Different From ‘Elvis’

When taking on the iconic role of Elvis Presley in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis, Austin Butler immersed himself fully in the role. The Oscar-nominated actor famously stayed in his Elvis accent off set, and even struggled to get rid of the rockstar’s inflection in his voice after filming wrapped. 

Buter plays Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen in the new sci-fi epic Dune: Part Two, a stark departure from playing one of the biggest figures in music history. But when getting into character to play the out-of-this-world Feyd, Butler told The Los Angeles Times that he didn’t get too deep into method acting this time. 

“I’ve definitely in the past, with Elvis, explored living within that world for three years and that being the only thing that I think about day and night,” Butler admitted. “With Feyd, I knew that that would be unhealthy for my family and friends.” 

Director Denis Villeneuve quipped in the joint interview that if Butler had gone full method, it would have been unhealthy for him too. As a result, the Elvis star decided to draw a sharper line between his character and himself. 

“I made a conscious decision to have a boundary,” he said. “It allowed for more freedom between ‘action’ and ‘cut’ because I knew I was going to protect everybody else outside of the context of what we were doing.”

“That’s not to say that it doesn’t bleed into your life,” he continued. “But I knew that I wasn’t going to do anything dangerous outside of that boundary, and in a way that allowed me to go deeper.”

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Villeneuve, for his part, marveled at Butler’s ability to step in and out of character with ease. 

“When the camera was on, it was like you were possessed. When the camera was off, you were still maybe 25 or 30 percent Feyd,” the director told him. “Just enough to still be present and focus but removed enough that you didn’t kill anybody on set.”

You can see Butler’s acting for yourself when Dune: Part Two hits theaters March 1.