Vlad Bunoan

Article (news)

Yong Chavez

ABS-CBN News North America

<div><span class="fr-video fr-deletable fr-fvc fr-dvb fr-draggable" contenteditable="false" draggable="true"><iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rBtAqGrBfyU?&amp;wmode=opaque&amp;rel=0" frameBorder="0" allowfullscreen="" class="fr-draggable"></iframe></span><br/></div><p>Film sets run on precision, which &quot;Frankenstein&quot; definitely did, because in every frame, the viewer can marvel at the pain-staking, meticulous work that was undertaken to bring the reimagined story to life. Beneath this epic creation is a beating heart that ran on the shared vulnerabilities of its trio of creators: Guillermo del Toro, Oscar Isaac, and Jacob Elordi.</p><p>Elordi endured 10-hour prosthetic sessions, with 42 rubber pieces at a time. Mike Hill, the makeup designer, described it in the film’s press conference simply as “literal torture,” and yet Elordi never complained. The actor’s own explanation was gentler.</p><p>I asked him how the mask impacted his performance, and he said it freed him.</p><p>“I think traditionally, a mask… has always been something that sets the soul free, you know, so I definitely experienced that,” Elordi said.</p><p>In the press conference, he shared that he found the key into the Creature from an unlikely place: a moment in a Toronto hotel room with his golden retriever when he was figuring out how to play the character.</p><p>“My dog has this kind of great innocence in the way that she moves and the way that she looks at things,” he said. They touched noses; a spark of static jumped. “And I knew then,” he said. “I’m good.”</p><p>“She gave you life,” del Toro observed.</p><div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:960px;display:block" width="960"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1763110668784GDT OSCAR ISAAC.png" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/><span class="fr-inner">Guillermo del Toro and Oscar Isaac. <em>Handout</em></span></span></span></div><p>Meanwhile, at the same press event, Isaac shared that playing Victor felt strangely joyful, even as the character descends into cruelty. Del Toro told him it was because Victor “has no doubts.” Isaac found liberation in that. When he first read the script’s final pages, he cried. “His recognition of him as his son… I found incredibly moving.”</p><p>Del Toro’s Frankenstein&quot; isn’t really about resurrecting bodies but resurrecting humanity. The creature is not a patchwork of corpses, he insists, he’s “a newly minted soul.”</p><p>And yet, the father-son tragedy is unmistakable, and the movie becomes, in the end, about forgiveness. Del Toro doesn’t shy away from emotions as a storyteller and how he expresses himself. He explains why.</p><p>“Because I&#x27;m Mexican,” he simply says during our interview. Pointing to Isaac, he adds, “It’s not an accident that you&#x27;re Oscar Hernandez and I&#x27;m Guillermo Del Toro, and the movie is an opera. I didn&#x27;t want to tackle it discreetly, obliquely. There&#x27;s a lot that is oblique and discreet within that structure, but the scale of the emotion, it has to be big. </p><div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:960px;display:block" width="960"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1763110636904OSCAR 2.png" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/><span class="fr-inner">Oscar Isaac in &#x27;Frankenstein.&#x27; <em>Handout</em></span></span></span></div><p>&quot;I talk about this with Baz Luhrmann, often people think that baroque or big is somewhat easier, and it isn&#x27;t. You have to sustain a structure and go from here to here to here, and you have to know exactly how you&#x27;re arranging the composition. You have to be very precise. And I know that in order to jolt the text that is 200 years old back into living and breathing and making emotions, you have to make big bets. And this was a big bet.”</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>Jacob Elordi and the Creature he carried</strong></div><p>Elordi is tall enough to throw off your depth perception — monumental in a way that’s funny because it’s impressive. I learned this the first time I met him, at a &quot;Frankenstein&quot; press conference, where <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DPfCHO9gfbz/?img_index=1">a photo of us</a> revealed a height difference so extreme it became a meme among my friends and a small hit on Instagram. Elordi laughed when I showed it to him. A warm, amused, self-aware laugh.</p><p>At our on-camera junket interview together with Isaac and del Toro a couple of days later, before I could even greet him, he accidentally knocked over a drink. A full topple. Liquid everywhere. He crouched down instinctively. Picture this: his 6-foot-5 frame folding into three feet of space and wiping up the mess.</p><p>Halfway up from the floor, he looked at me as I sat somewhat shocked at the completely unusual scene of a movie star cleaning up and said: “It was great meeting you. That’s all the time we have.”</p><div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:960px;display:block" width="960"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1763110581762GDT JACOB.png" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/><span class="fr-inner">Guillermo del Toro and Jacob Elordi. <em>Handout</em></span></span></span></div><p>I think I mumbled a response, but his deadpan humor definitely defused the monotony of another press day. And maybe that’s the best introduction to Elordi: a little chaos, a little grace, and a joke to break the ice.</p><p>Once the floor was sufficiently dry, we talked about masks: literal ones, emotional ones.</p><p>He said, “I feel completely other every time I make a film. The circumstances are so, so different to my everyday life that I always feel changed, you know. In some kind of way.”</p><p>He meant it. None of this was actorly posturing. When he spoke about the Creature at the press conference, he described a stage direction in the script: the Creature looks at Victor and pulls down his mask. “Now run.”</p><p>“When I read that,” he told me, “I heard drums in my head.” Elordi’s process may sound accidental when he tells it, but one could feel how intuitive and deeply felt his performing choices are.</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>No cameras, no selfies, more truth</strong></div><p>A few days after the junket, I saw him again, this time at an event for &quot;The Narrow Road to the Deep North.&quot; Beforehand his publicist had requested a ban on selfies because Elordi wanted actual conversations, which really went well. He was talking freely and laughing with a rotating small groups of journalists.</p><p>Just before the event ended, when I eventually made it to the circle around him, I heard him mention &quot;The Kissing Booth.&quot;</p><div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:960px;display:block" width="960"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1763110548865FRANKENSTEIN 1.png" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/><span class="fr-inner">Jacob Elordi in &#x27;Frankenstein.&#x27; <em>Handout</em></span></span></span></div><p>Actors usually treat their early commercial hits like exes they’d rather forget. Not Elordi. He talked about it plainly, like a person grateful for a first job. I told him how refreshing it was to hear him credit the film instead of distancing himself from it. He nodded. “It taught me how to work in the business,” he said.</p><p>Across these three meetings, something became clear: Jacob Elordi is not haunted by his roles, but they become part of him.</p><p>In &quot;Frankenstein,&quot; he channels something raw. Not suffering, exactly, but a willingness to open a door most people keep shut.</p><p>During the press conference, he said: “All that suffering and pain and trauma is already in our system… Playing the Creature was just accessing it.”</p>

<p>Beneath this epic creation is a beating heart that ran on the shared vulnerabilities of its trio of creators: Guillermo del Toro, Oscar Isaac, and Jacob Elordi.</p>

Beneath this epic creation is a beating heart that ran on the shared vulnerabilities of its trio of creators: Guillermo del Toro, Oscar Isaac, and Jacob Elordi.

Here in Hollywood: Inside 'Frankenstein,' Guillermo del Toro’s electric, messy, human resurrection

News

Entertainment

Lifestyle

Sports

Metro.Style

More

Traffic

Manila

Horoscope

Movies & Series

Here in Hollywood: Inside 'Frankenstein,' Guillermo del Toro’s electric, messy, human resurrection

Yong Chavez,

ABS-CBN News North America

Published Nov 14, 2025 05:23 PM PHT

Read More:

Here in Hollywood

Yong Chavez

Frankenstein

Jacob Elordi

Oscar Isaac

Guillermo del Toro

Netflix

ABS-CBN is the leading media and entertainment company in the Philippines, offering quality content across TV, radio, digital, and film. Committed to public service and promoting Filipino values, ABS-CBN continues to inspire and connect audiences worldwide.

Corporate

Investors

Governance

International Distribution

Corporate

Governance

Investors

International Distribution

NPC Seal of Registration

Privacy Policy

AI Policy

Terms of Service

Advertise with Us

© 2026 ABS-CBN Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

NPC Seal of Registration

Privacy Policy

Terms of Service

AI Policy

Advertise with Us

© 2026 ABS-CBN Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

NPC Seal of Registration

Privacy Policy

Terms of Service

AI Policy

Advertise with Us

© 2026 ABS-CBN Corporation. All Rights Reserved.