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Filming for Apple’s Formula 1 movie starring Brad Pitt is continuing at the Hungarian Grand Prix in an adjusted form to factor in strike action in the United States.
For the second race in a row, Pitt’s fictional 11th team has a presence in the F1 paddock.
After the British GP marked the ‘public’ debut for the APXGP team and its car, which will be key parts of a film in which Pitt plays an older F1 driver who emerges from retirement to compete alongside a rookie, their paddock set-up is in use again in Hungary.
The full garage and pitwall set-up plus a hospitality unit and filming station are all on-site at the Hungaroring.
This was always planned to be the second race in which the realistic and fully functioning props were used around filming in a live paddock.
It continues despite inaccurate reports filming for the project had been shut down due to strike action in the US.
The Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) is a labour union representing around 160,000 media professionals including Hollywood movie stars.
Their strike action, which follows that of the Writers Guild of America, focuses mainly on base pay for residuals (for example reruns, syndication or streaming) and concerns of being replaced or undermined by recreated digital images of themselves utilising artificial intelligence.
Pitt is a member of that union and it was widely and erroneously reported that his movie was one of many that needed to be shut down as a result of the strike.
But production is continuing, just with an adjusted schedule.
Pitt is understood to have conducted his last on-screen work (for now) prior to the strike action starting on July 14 and the suggestion is there are no SAG actors working on the project in Hungary so no picket lines have been crossed.
There will likely be more on-track filming in Hungary, but this will be handled by stand-ins.
This was largely the case at the British GP too, when the cars were driven by professionals for most of the filming sessions, although Pitt did complete one himself there.
