Trivia / Red Sparrow

• Awesome, Dear Boy: The reason why Jennifer Lawrence accepted the role, even if it was too sexual for her liking (which she eventually grew to like as well, as said in Troubled Production below).
• Bad Export for You: The film underwent cuts in the UK to obtain a 15 rating (down from an 18). This censored version is also the one on UK DVD and Blu-ray.
• Box Office Bomb: The film had a $69 million budget and only made $46 million in the domestic box office, although it was successful enough overseas to barely recoup its production costs. This marked the fourth consecutive film for Jennifer Lawrence that failed to make back its budget in the US, after X-Men: Apocalypse, Passengers, and mother! (2017).
• Dyeing for Your Art: Jennifer Lawrence spent four months doing ballet training to prepare for the role.
• Executive Meddling: The British censor board ordered some edits to the torture scenes so the film could get a 15 rating.
• Fake American: Joel Edgerton is Australian.
• Fake Russian: Several main characters in the movie adaptation, including:
  • Jennifer Lawrence (American) as Dominika Egorova, accordingly approximating a Russian accent for the role.
  • Charlotte Rampling (English) as the Headmistress of Sparrow School, who still uses her distinctive British accent.
  • Jeremy Irons (English) as General Vladimir Korchnoi.
  • Matthias Schoenaerts (Belgian) as Vanya Egurov.
• Follow the Leader: The film was noted to have similarities to other female-led spy thrillers like Salt and Atomic Blonde.
• Production Posse: Francis Lawrence had directed Jennifer Lawrence (no relation) in the last three of the four films in The Hunger Games franchise.
• Reality Subtext: Even if she ruled the two experiences as very different, Jennifer Lawrence noted that there were similarities between the sexual nature of the story and having her private nude photos stolen in the infamous cloud hacks of 2014.
• Separated-at-Birth Casting: Matthias Schoenaerts, Ivan's actor, resembles Vladimir Putin — on whom his character is based — a great deal. This was apparently accidental.
• Troubled Production: Mostly averted, though with a small and amusing note. Jennifer Lawrence, who had previously felt shy towards doing nude scenes in her work, got over her insecurity in this film thanks to the crew's efforts to make feel comfortable while shooting. The trouble is that she became so casual spending her time on the set nude that she ended up making the cast and crew uncomfortable instead.
  • This ironically parallels the Shameful Strip scene in the movie where her character takes control of her nudity and makes the man who wanted to prey on her uncomfortable.
• Wag the Director: Subverted. Jennifer Lawrence was shown an early cut of the movie, and told that if she was uncomfortable with any of the nudity then it would be deleted. She approved all the nude scenes that were filmed.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Darren Aronofsky was going to direct the film at one point. David Fincher (with Rooney Mara as the lead) were also in consideration as well.
  • At one point the story was going to be relocated to 1970s Budapest in order to give it a "timeless" feel. When Francis Lawrence came back on board he re-set it in modern times.

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