‘Instead of Vietnam, we went to Beckton gasworks. All we had to do was put signs on it and blow it up’

Matthew Modine, who played Private JT ‘Joker’ Davis

I received the script through my mail slot in New York with a letter from Stanley introducing himself: “Hi, my name is Stanley Kubrick. I’ve got this film I’m making about the Vietnam war and I wonder if you’d consider participating.” He didn’t say it was for the part of Private Joker, and I’d finished a movie just previous to this called Birdy. So when I read the script, I thought maybe he was asking me to audition for Private Pyle, because of the fragility of that character. But I was never sure, because Stanley never said.



I suggested Vincent D’Onofrio join the cast. I thought Vince was an amazing actor, and I promised to call him if anything came up. I got to London, and Stanley said, “You know, we have a terrific cast, but I don’t have anybody to play Gomer Pyle.” I said, “I’ve got somebody. He’s not fat and he’s not southern, but he’s a great actor.’ So Vincent auditioned and Stanley said, “He’s perfect – will he gain the weight?” I said, “That’s up to you guys.” [D’Onofrio put on 31kg or 5 stone.]

We shot the battle scenes at Beckton gasworks, London, near the Isle of Dogs. We did the Vietnam scenes first, before bootcamp, but they started to overlap, and there was maybe a month where I was wearing a wig, because my head had to be shaved. I was never certain why we shot the film backwards, but I knew we had to be out of Beckton gasworks by a certain date because it was scheduled for demolition. It would have been a completely different film if we’d gone to the jungles and shot Vietnam that way. The street fighting, I think, is one of the things that makes the film timeless. It looks like Afghanistan or Iraq today.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Stanley Kubrick working on set in Beckton. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

Stanley was really making a film about the effects of war – what happens when young men who’ve been taught their whole lives to respect life then become killers. It’s testament to his direction that you have a character that might normally be considered a bad guy – the drill instructor, played by Lee Ermey – and yet nobody cheers, nobody’s happy, when the drill instructor gets shot and killed, because you know that guy was trying to teach those guys to work together.

Leon [Vitali, casting director] worked for hundreds of hours with Lee to turn him into that character. I mean, Lee was a drill instructor, so there was a natural ability, but he didn’t have the training. Had Lou Gossett Jr not won the Oscar for An Officer and a Gentleman, Lee would have won for that performance. But the way the Academy works is, “Oh, we already gave it to a guy who played a drill instructor. Let’s give it to somebody else.”

Leon Vitali, assistant to Stanley Kubrick and casting director

Meeting Stanley was a turning point for me. I’d been an actor on his 1975 film Barry Lyndon and, through him, I started seeing things from a different angle. I talked to Stanley about working with him, and he said, “OK, let’s see what happens.” Then he rang me to see if I’d be interested in helping look for the little boy in The Shining. After that came Full Metal Jacket.

Stanley had wanted to make a Vietnam movie for quite a long time, but he didn’t think the moment was right – he always said that you needed distance from a subject like that to be able to do it justice.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Vincent D’Onofrio, Matthew Modine and drill sergeant R Lee Ermey in Full Metal Jacket. Photograph: Everett/Rex/Shutterstock

When we were casting we never sent out any kind of character description. Stanley was just very, very open to someone being a good actor, and we’d try them out in different roles. Once we’d found Matthew Modine and cast him as Joker, it was a process of getting videotapes in, advertising in the States and even in the UK. It was like a jigsaw puzzle. We were three-quarters of the way into the film before we finished casting.

We were well into the shoot before we finished casting. The extras came from the Territorial Army Leon Vitali

If Stanley could have shot Full Metal Jacket in his back garden, he would have. It wasn’t so much that he didn’t like to travel, he just didn’t see the necessity of it. Instead, we found Beckton gasworks, which was constructed by the same company of architects that built in the city of Hué, Vietnam. All we had to do was dress it up, put signs on it and blow it up.

We found the extras in the Territorial Army. I auditioned them first, then had them come to Beckton. I’d ask them a few basic questions, but what can you tell from that? So Lee and I decided we would line them up, just as if they’d got off the bus at the training camp, and then Lee would go down, one by one, and just decimate them. It was astonishing. We videoed it, and then we transcribed all that dialogue. There were over 800 pages. We built the scenes out of that dialogue and then just let him loose.