There is no nobility in poverty.
I have been a rich man and I have been a poor man.
And I choose rich every fucking time.
Because at least as a rich man, when I have to face my problems,
I show up in the back of a limo, wearing a $2,000 suit
and a $40,000 gold fucking watch!
I just fell in love with this character. I really wanted to do this movie.
And I couldn't get Scorsese out of my mind,
because he's able to bring out a life in these characters,
a reality, and the sense of humor, to that dark side,
which very, very few filmmakers can accomplish.
$22 million in three fucking hours!
Marty has a way of exposing the ugliness of criminal life
in a kind of almost enticing way.
I wait all week for the fucking Equalizer
and they have to fucking... Hello.
Human beings, even in their most ludicrous types of behavior,
are funny.
Marty is a brilliant filmmaker.
He can point the finger at somebody and show how foolish they are
for their excess.
You look at these guys and think, "This seems to be a lot of fun."
Well, it doesn't just look that way, they really did have a lot of fun.
In fact, that's really all they could do, is have fun, and more fun,
and more on top of that, until it wasn't so much fun anymore.
So, the challenge is to show that honestly,
without tipping the scales into judgment.
This was one man's account of a very insane time in recent history.
And what was so refreshing was his absolute candid honesty
about every radical endeavor that he went through.
Whenever you're presented with an opportunity to do a movie,
you look for that kind of honesty in a lead character and a storyline.
Jordan started out, you know, he was a regular kid,
grew up in Queens, his parents were accountants,
wanted to make good, wanted to make a lot of money,
wanted to be successful, like we all do, and just fell down the rabbit hole.
I think he really thought that he could bypass morality, or surpass morality,
with a combination of money and drugs.
This is a guy who lived like a rock star,
he had everything, everyone has ever wanted,
and it wasn't enough. He still wanted more.
It's set in Wall Street,
but it's only the backdrop to one man's journey
from nothing to everything, and then back to nothing again.
Terry Winter wrote this screenplay
that encapsulated all the most insane bits of Jordan Belfort's life.
And, in a way, really, stylistically wrote it for Martin Scorsese.
Marty's drawn to telling stories about flawed and broken people.
And Jordan is certainly that.
The story is told in that classic, Scorsese-staccato pacing.
I love Marty. I've grown up watching his movies.
You're drawn in by the spectacle and the excitement,
and how kinetic the filmmaking is,
and the violence and the extreme characters and the humor.
But also, the moral aspects of his stories were wonderful.
What're you gonna do? Spend the rest of your life in jail?
- Is that what you want? - No.
- Of course not. - Okay.
Okay! You got all the money in the world.
You need everybody else's money?
Terry Winter's script had so much humor in it.
And, in a lot of ways, I remember Marty telling me
about Goodfellas being almost a dark comedy,
and this lent itself to that style of filmmaking.
Marty's so good at doing the most dramatic version of events,
and making it believable and real.
He can take something off of a page,
turn it into a visual storytelling masterpiece,
and the energy of it is just so incredible.
It's like a tsunami of craziness.
We got plans up here that's gonna take this company
into the fucking stratosphere!
You piss up the SEC's leg,
you end up with your tits in a ringer.
There's only two types of movies you can make,
or two types of stories to tell.
There's the aspirational story, which is, "Do this,"
or there's the cautionary movie, which is, "Don't do this."
And, you know, Marty really has done both,
but the "don't do this" moments in his movies are really memorable.
I had to have total freedom with the cast and crew
to do what I needed to do.
Which meant we all decided that we were gonna go all the way with it,
as much as we could.
He's obviously attracted to extreme characters.
And he's done films where, they're murderers and villains,
but you grow to love them.
It's very strange designing clothes
for characters who you actually have no empathy for,
at all.
Knowing that Marty is the director that he is,
he's gonna bring something different to it.
That's always the big question that you have going into a movie,
whether audiences will be responsive to people committing atrocious acts.
That was one of the things that Marty said very early on,
you know, "Through my experiences in making movies,
"if you're authentic with the characters and who they are and don't betray that,
"people will go along with anything."
It's always fascinating, about the betrayal of trust,
in a story.
You finally found a broker on Wall Street that you can trust,
and who can consistently make you money.
Sound fair enough?
And so, there's that element that's always been in my movies
that deals with these characters that break that trust.
And, right here, going in,
they're pretending there's trust.
Going in, they've broken it already.
It's a very exciting role for Leo.
From an audience perspective,
you wanna love him, but you kind of hate him, too.
And the movie doesn't make a judgment, it doesn't apologize,
doesn't explain, it just presents the information
for you to draw your own conclusions.
One of the references that I had was the film Caligula.
Ýt was a massive orgy of wealth and drugs,
and a group of people that really wanted to succeed at any cost.
Our attitude was simply, "Let's really pull no punches.
"Let's not try to whitewash anything.
"Let's not try to make these characters, quote-unquote 'likeable,'
"let's portray them for what they are."
And that means also exploring the unbelievable time that they did have
during those few years where they were completely unregulated
and had no rules.
For Leo and I, and the other guys, to play these people,
we had to understand that this behavior is okay
within these characters, even though we disagree with it.
To play this person, you have to justify that you're okay with yourself
doing these things.
And then you get home, and you're like, "Oh, my God! Like, what did I do?"
You find all these reasons and you make up your backstory,
and you justify it to yourself, so that you can really commit
to the decisions you're making in the script, and not feel false about it.
- You're a father now, Jordan. - Yeah.
- You're a father now. - I know...
And you're still acting like an infant!
Fuck!
Those actors had to have a reckless abandon,
and, just as Marty doesn't judge the characters in any given moment,
the actors can't, either.
We are about to become fucking legends...
With Marty, the energy was almost like a gigantic party on set all the time.
Everyone brings something fun to the table, brings something interesting.
"Let's all give each other something to react to."
For me, it was one of the most enjoyable
film experiences I've ever had,
and I think Marty will say the same.
In the five films that I've worked with him,
I've never seen him having this good of a time,
and being as open and free to try whatever came up.
Marty creates a great atmosphere on the set.
He's open to suggestions.
He likes people to improvise, if they can.
And there's no more fun for an actor, than to be able to do that.
Marty's way of creating this in a collaborative atmosphere
for his actors to prosper,
and for us as producers, it gives us nothing but pleasure
to see people who are working hard
but at the same time, getting a lot of pleasure
and getting fun out of the whole process.
I'm gonna teach each and every one of you
to be Captain fucking Ahab.
Captain who?
From the fucking...
The book, motherfucker. From the book.
Our approach was to be very improvisational.
I've never been a fan of the bush, to be honest.
- Really? - Yeah.
I don't mind it.
I think all of us wanted to connect with our characters,
and then, there was a massive rehearsal period,
there was a lot of improvisation there.
And we just integrated all that rehearsal into the filmmaking process.
What the fuck is EJ Entertainment?
Well, that's...
We had reference points of where we wanted scenes to go.
But it was incredibly loose.
There would be a lot of sequences that were only a page long,
and we'd be improvising for hours and hours.
And when you have the great actors that I got to act alongside,
anything can happen on that day, and a lot of times, it did.
Leo's great! I mean, he's amazing to work with.
Just go in any direction, and he'll just be right there,
and it pushes me to do more, and take more risks.
Enough of this shit'll make you invincible.
Leo's a daring guy. You can tell that he's worked with Marty before.
They have a partnership, they have a wonderful shorthand,
and it's wonderful to watch them work together.
FBI!
When you get a direction from Martin Scorsese,
you're part of his vision.
With that said, there's also the allowance,
"Now, go do what you do."
I have offered our lovely sales assistant,
Danielle Harrison, here,
$10,000 to shave her fucking head!
Every day we're on set, the scene would take multiple different directions.
He'd say one little riff, one little bit of improv,
and all of us would react to that,
and we'd have to steer back to what the scene was ultimately about,
then we'd go off into another tangent.
You show me a pay stub for $72,000 on it,
I quit my job right now and I work for you.
Jonah was just an electrifying force
that ignited each scene, every single day,
and I'm very thankful that he did that for us.
You have my money taped to your tits.
Okay? Technically, you do work for me.
Jonah really adds a perfect dynamic
that you don't see on paper when you read the script.
What are these sides? They cure cancer?
That's the problem. That's why they were expensive.
- Shut the fuck up. - I'm serious.
Stop.
He's so witty and clever, and he just comes out with these lines,
said with a complete dead-pan sort of face.
And, so many times, we just crack up.
I'm just like, "I don't know how he comes up with this stuff.
"Ýt's hilarious."
You know, if the kid was retarded,
I would, you know, drive it up to the country
and just, like, you know, open the door and say,
"You're free now." You know, like, "Run free."
- Jordan Belfort. - Yes, sir.
Mark Hanna.
Matthew came in with a very specific idea for this character.
Two. One. Let's fuck!
He went into this monolog that was so incredibly rich and colorful,
and insane, and really introduces the entire audience
to the world of Wall Street at that time.
Tootski?
Oh, no. Thank you, though.
And encapsulates all the insanity in one unbelievable monolog.
Name of the game.
Move the money from your client's pocket into your pocket.
But if you make your clients money at the same time,
it's advantageous to everyone. Correct?
No.
He used the reference points that were in the script,
but ultimately, all the color and all the flavor is all him.
Nobody knows if a stock is gonna go up, down, sideways, or in fucking circles.
Least of all stockbrokers.
He was on set, sort of, beating his chest.
And I looked at Marty, and I was like, "Do you see what's going on here?"
And they integrated that into the scene,
and that became the sort of, chant of Wolf of Wall Street.
That was only the second week of shooting.
So, that opened the movie for us, in a way that we were able to just
not have any limits as to what would be deemed absurd. It's all absurd.
Jean Dujardin was another actor that infused us with incredible energy.
This was a world where he had to speak English a lot.
But his ability to improvise in English really astounded us.
Yeah. I don't understand. I'm sorry.
Anything that Marty wanted to throw at him, or I wanted to throw at him,
he would react to.
The only way the Banque Réal de Genéve
would cooperate with a foreign legal body
is if the crime being pursued is also a crime in Switzerland.
From a financial standpoint,
you are now in heaven.
He has a great sense of humor, also.
And it transcends the language.
So, he was able to pick out things in our dialog and go with them,
and make it really enjoyable.
Not Croy. Not Rue de la Croy. It's Croix.
Aren't you married?
Well... Yeah, but what?
Married people can't have friends?
We're not gonna be friends.
Margot Robbie, gave as well as she took on this, holding her own.
Mommy is just so sick and tired of wearing panties.
She worked diligently on creating that character.
And, for her, a lot of the stuff was reactive.
When I first read the script, my initial thought was,
"It'd be an amazing role, but, my God, I could never get naked!"
And now, it's just like, "Well, clothes off."
Because far crazier things are happening.
Everyone's so committed to making the best movie possible
that everyone just goes further and further with it,
and everyone's just there with you.
You go out on a limb, and everyone's just going out on a limb as well.
And Marty just lets you improvise for five minutes,
do whatever you feel like doing.
I don't love you anymore, Jordan!
Oh, you don't love me?
The last scene that Naomi's in,
we completely made up the night before shooting it.
And it went from being conversation, to kidnapping and drugs,
and punching each other and smashing windows.
It just went in a whole different direction.
Throughout the film,
with all the chaos and all the decadence,
the money and the cheating and the stealing and the humor,
there's gotta be one good guy in this whole damn thing.
His name is Denham.
He's an agent with the New York office.
Don't you understand?
He's smart, you're dumb.
Kyle Chandler's character is incredibly important.
Through our conversations, we created the scene on a boat,
which, to me, is a very integral part of the movie.
Ever been on one of these before?
A boat?
I learned how to sail when I was six.
That was all done through his improvisation as well.
And that led to this incredible scene
that I think is one of the most important ones in the entire movie.
You go after real criminals,
which makes me wonder what the hell you're investigating me for?
First day, on the boat, I haven't even met DiCaprio...
- If I'm not mistaken... - No.
...you just tried to bribe a federal officer.
No, technically...
Thankfully, Leonardo DiCaprio couldn't have made me feel more comfortable.
And making your other actor feel more comfortable
allows not only him to do his work, but allows you to do your work.
And once you're in that realm,
then you just play.
- Good for you, little man. - Little man?
Good for you.
Me, the little man?
They're gonna need to send in a fucking SWAT team
'cause I ain't going nowhere!
Why bother telling a story of somebody who's unremarkable?
People say, "Well, that type of person, that sort."
I guess what that means is that they try to distance themselves from them.
It's someone else, it's not me.
But, in actuality, I feel it's not someone else, it's us.
It's you and me,
and maybe if we had been born under different circumstances,
maybe we would have wound up doing exactly the same things.
It's a matter of facing and recognizing that part of us,
which is a part of our common humanity.
Stratton Oakmont is America!
There is a vicarious thrill about watching criminals.
There's something voyeuristic and fun about being a part of that lifestyle
without the consequences.
You can just live it and go, "Wow, that was a fun life to view,
"but I'm glad I'm not part of it."
I don't think that movies are necessarily there to tell a moral tale.
They're there to depict people as authentically as you can.
To me, those are the films that I wanna watch,
films that I think about.
It's been a long journey to get this movie made,
and I'm incredibly happy with the outcome.
This was a culmination of a lot of different artists getting together
with a very specific attitude.
As a result, you have something that I think is incredibly loose,
incredibly entertaining,
very authentic.
What movies should ultimately be.