Guillermo del Toro served as the secret back-up director on William Friedkin’s final film

While promoting The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial this weekend at the Venice Film Festival—where the movie, director William Friedkin’s last, will have its world premiere—producer Annabelle Dunne dropped a surprising behind-the-scenes detail: Guillermo del Toro served as the film’s “back-up director,” meaning he was on-board to finish the movie if something happened to Friedkin before shooting had wrapped. (It didn’t. He had completed the film before his death on August 8.)

But, as Dunne noted, this was a contractual obligation that is apparently “very common” in show business even though she calls it a “state secret,” adding that, “Hollywood is ageist.” Friedkin, who was 87 when he died, said he had to “think about” who he would nominate as his back-up director, but he had thought of someone by the next day, with Dunne saying it went down like this: “Ok, honey I have the guy. Get a pen: it’s Guillermo del Toro, you got that?”

Del Toro and Friedkin were longtime friends, and though Variety says del Toro was in the middle of promoting his Pinocchio movie, he vowed to come to set “every single day” just so he could sit next to Friedkin and watch him work. “It was a joy for all of us,” Dunne said, “including the actors, to have his presence there.” She said del Toro “made it abundantly clear” that it was Friedkin’s movie and that he was just there as their “mascot.”

At least based on the Variety story, it doesn’t say who contractually obligated Friedkin to name a back-up director, but The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial is coming from Paramount and will be released internationally on Paramount+ (where Paramount+ is available) and on Showtime in the United States. It stars Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Clarke, and Lance Reddick (it will be one of Reddick’s final film appearances after his death, but he’ll also be in Regina King’s Shirley and the John Wick spin-off Ballerina).