05/05/2023
NEWS STORY
As rumours of an 11th team led by Brad Pitt swirl on social media, Lewis Hamilton insists that his forthcoming F1 movie will be authentic.
Excitable at the very best of times, a situation not helped by those sections of the media that depend on clickbait, F1 social media went into overdrive on Thursday following a tweet from ESPN.
The American broadcaster tweeted: "Brad Pitt will be driving an actual F1 car alongside the rest of the grid at Silverstone as part of the new movie that's in production.
"Directors Jerry Bruckheimer and Joseph Kosinski will enter an '11th team' to film on track for the rest of the season."
While Michael Andretti no doubt wondered where the movie makers had come up with the requisite $600m dilution fee, Colton Herta joked: "Brad Pitt got a super licence before me. Tough!"
Sure enough the rumour factory got to work, putting two and two together and coming up with 36.
Of course, there is no 11th team, and for all manner of reasons, not least safety, actors, even Brad Pitt, would never be allowed to take part in a practice session far less a Grand Prix, even if Stefano Domenicali has warned that the making of the movie would be "intrusive".
Though unable to go into too much detail, Lewis Hamilton, who is an advisor to the movie and a co-producer, insists that it will be authentic.
"I don't know absolutely every single plan of all the different things we could be doing with the paddock and all those sorts of things," he told reporters. "I'm more focused right now on making sure that the script is where it needs to be. So that's where all the time currently is going through the scripts, making sure we've got a really great, diverse cast.
"Joe's focus," he continued, referring to director Joseph Kosinski, "is to make sure that we're as embedded into this sport as possible, to make sure that it's authentic and that all of you and racing fans, see its authenticity and say this is believable.
"Secondly, have a view of racing from a different perspective than you might see on TV. So I'm spending a lot of time right now helping Joe and the team get the script right. That's an amazing process, and I really enjoy it."
It's thought that Pitt and other actors in the movie will take part in such things as the driver parade at races in order to get the required backgrund shots, while the American would then take to the track in a modified F2 or F3 car at other times for action shots no doubt with other drivers in similar machinery.
This is pretty much the standard and was how the 1966 movie Grand Prix was filmed. Footage from race day of the British Grand Prix was used in the movie and on the following Monday fans were invited to head back to Brands Hatch as extras for additional scenes including Pete Aron's (James Garner) fiery crash in the Yamura.
Pitpass has first hand knowledge of this since a certain editor (and his mother) were in the crowd.
Check out our Friday gallery from Miami here.