In an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live with guest host Anthony Anderson, The Suicide Squad director James Gunn and star Margot Robbie revealed that she pulled off an impressive feat on set by unlocking her handcuffs with her feet.
Joined by John Cena, who portrays Peacemaker in the upcoming superhero film, the director and actress broke down the sequence when asked about the most difficult thing Gunn tasked Robbie with.
“The hardest thing I asked her to do was something I never thought she’d be able to do,” said Gunn at the 11:30 point of the clip above. “There’s a scene in which Margot is being hung up by her handcuffs over her head, and she has to get her toes along a dead body and pick a key off the dead body…[then] flip her toes backwards to put the key into the lock, over her head, unlock the lock, and then come down straight.”
The impressive-sounding sequence was actually all Robbie, Gunn said, but the way it was shot makes it hard to notice. “She is like a human Swiss army knife, who was able to flip herself backwards and do this,” he continued. “Torturing Margot was my favorite day on set, and watching this scene with her just flipping backwards was beyond incredible. I was so happy that it worked, and I was mesmerized by it. And then I got into the editing room with the footage, and you have this little cuff on [her] outfit that covers her face. It looks like a stunt person, but it’s Margot doing it in the movie.”
The Guardians of the Galaxy franchise shepherd described not showing Harley Quinn’s face in the scene as one of his “biggest regrets” of the whole movie. “I’m very dexterous with my toes, I could braid someone’s hair with my toes, I reckon,” Robbie replied. “James is like, ‘Don’t worry we’ll cut in...don’t worry about it.’ And I was like, ‘Nah, I reckon I got it, actually.’”
She also said the scene was almost shot differently, but they knew it wouldn’t be convincing to the film’s editor Fred Raskin. “I remember we were gonna have to…cut in close, we were gonna have to use someone else, because I had to get to another set,” Robbie continued, “But our editor actually edited Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and he was like, ‘Those aren’t Margot Robbie’s feet, I have seen Margot Robbie’s feet.’”
Trust any collaborator of Quentin Tarantino to immediately recognize people by their feet.
John Cena, meanwhile, joked that the hardest thing he had to do on set was eat 36 empanadas while shooting a scene.
Check out the interview above; there’s also some new The Suicide Squad footage at the 14:50 mark.
