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Thanks to his time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and his previous career as a pro wrestler, Dune: Part Two star Dave Bautista is probably still predominantly considered an action guy. But if you’ve been paying attention to his non-Marvel roles the past few years, which include movies by M Night Shyamalan, Rian Johnson, Sam Mendes, Zack Snyder and, of course, Dune director Denis Villeneuve, you’ll see there’s something else going on here. Those directors, along with Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn, are filmmakers we think of as auteurs.
Bautista didn’t just happen to work with those folks, though.
“I was given the advice early in my career from Zoe Saldana to be very picky about my directors. It came from a conversation where I was telling her that I wanted real acting roles. I wanted roles that were layered and character driven, not these typical action roles,” Bautista told me. “And she’s like: ‘Directors. You gotta be choosy about your directors and you’ll find the roles.’
“And so I took that advice to heart and I sought out directors like M. Night, like De