Trivia
In preparation for his role, Shia LaBeouf worked extensively with traders and researchers on the world of finance and economy. He even invested 20,000 dollars, and ended up making more than 400,000 dollars. A few people who trained him were later arrested for illegal acts of trading.
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Javier Bardem was the studio's favorite for the role of the villain. However, he turned the role down to star in Biutiful, and so Josh Brolin was cast. Brolin previously starred in Oliver Stone's film W..
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Michael Douglas' first day of filming was September 18th, 2009, exactly one week before his 65th birthday. His first scene filmed was Gordon Gekko getting out of jail.
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Title was originally "Money Never Sleeps". When Oliver Stone signed on to direct, he added "Wall Street 2" to the title. Later the numeral was dropped, since Stone wanted the film to be seen as both a sequel and a stand alone story.
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Blake Lively and Lea Michele were both rumored to play Winnie Gekko. Lively was cast as the female lead in Oliver Stone's next film Savages.
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The second time that Shia LaBeouf has played a character named Jacob. The first time was in New York, I Love You.
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Susan Sarandon's second collaboration in two years with Michael Douglas and Carey Mulligan. She last starred with Douglas in Solitary Man and Mulligan in The Greatest.
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Carey Mulligan's schedule was planned with consideration of her publicity tour for An Education, so most of her scenes were shot later in production.
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New York cosmopolitans playing themselves were asked to don their own clothes and jewelry.
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Screenwriter Allan Loeb is a licensed stock broker. According to Loeb, he was most fascinated by the Bernie Madoff scandal, and how it had seemed so low-class. Director Oliver Stone has since dismissed the notion that Madoff would be referenced in the film.
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Stanley Weiser, original writer for Wall Street, was previously attached to the project. However, his involvement with the sequel fell through due to creative differences. His script involved Gekko getting involved with the Chinese markets. After the 2008 financial crisis, 20th Century Fox ordered the script to be rewritten to include current events. At the time Oliver Stone was steadfastly declining to return as director, and Weiser didn't want to be involved if Stone wasn't going to direct, so he dropped out. Later Stone was given a new draft by Allan Loeb and decided to direct after all.
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The "Money Never Sleeps" subtitle comes from the original Wall Street. Gekko calls Bud early one morning, and after Bud answers the phone, Gekko says: "Money never sleeps..."
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Michael Douglas, Charlie Sheen, and Sylvia Miles reprise their roles from Wall Street, and Oliver Stone again makes a cameo.
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After the studio couldn't get Javier Bardem for the role Bretton James, Edward Norton, Martin Henderson, Simon Baker, Mark Wahlberg, Aaron Eckhart and James Franco were considered to play the role, but Josh Brolin was eventually cast.
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The first Oliver Stone film to appear at Cannes. Stone's earlier films Natural Born Killers and U Turn had been rejected. After screening the film at Cannes, Stone responded to the reception by making some changes to the ending.
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Like the original Wall Street, the sequel is set historically two years prior to the date of its release.
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The college scenes were filmed at Fordham University, which was also featured in Michael Douglas's previous film Solitary Man.
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Josh Brolin played President George W. Bush in Oliver Stone's previous film W. and Frank Langella played President Richard Nixon in an Oscar nominated performance in Frost/Nixon released the same year. Stone directed another film on President Nixon, Nixon, in which Anthony Hopkins was the first actor to be nominated for an academy award for Best Actor playing Nixon. Furthermore, Bush was in office when the financial crisis depicted in the film occurred, and the film W. was released near the same time in 2008. A poster of W. is visible in Bretton's office, and it is the only acknowledgment that President Bush is President in the film's alternate reality of 2008.
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Gekko's line "You stop telling lies about me, I'll stop telling the truth about you" is lifted from American politician Adlai Stevenson's famous quote: "I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican friends... that if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we will stop telling the truth about them."
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Bill Clark is based on Henry Paulson who was Treasury Secretary under the George W. Bush Administration when the financial crisis occurred. Similarly, the New York Federal Reserve Head played by Jason Clarke is clearly modeled on Timothy Geithner who held that position in real life in 2008 before succeeding Paulson as Treasury Secretary.
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The fictional bank Churchill Schwartz is based on both Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan/Chase.In real life, J. P. Morgan/Chase originally purchased Bear Stearns for two dollars per share on the direction of Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, only to be later changed to ten dollars per share. Frank Langella's character Louis Zabel was told he would initially receive the same amount for his company during the scene of New York Federal Reserve meeting. Also, Louis Zabel accuses Bretton James, of exacting revenge for refusing to bail out James' Churchill Schwartz during the market crash of 2000. This is loosely based off Bear Stearns decision not to assist Goldman Sachs and other investment banks to do the same for infamous hedge fund Long Term Capital Management following the Russian bond default in 1998.
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According to Shia LaBeouf, 90% of the people that he met during research had gotten into economics and stocks because of Gordon Gekko's legacy. LaBeouf remarked that he would make deals with people, that if they helped him out, LaBeouf would introduce them to Michael Douglas.
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Oliver Stone rang the NASDAQ opening bell on September 20, 2010 to celebrate the film's New York premiere.
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In his study as he is talking to Jake Moore (Shia LaBeouf) in his office, over Bretton James' (Josh Brolin) shoulder is a picture of James standing with President George W. Bush, whom Brolin had previously played in W..
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When the film was released, Shia LaBeouf told a story about a disagreement he had with Oliver Stone over a line. He told the press: "We're in the Adirondacks, and Josh Brolin and I are shooting this bike scene. And at one point I say to Josh a line - 'You should look at yourself in the mirror first and see yourself. It might scare you. I looked at the line for a couple of months and thought I'd go to Oliver and say, 'You look at the mirror and look at yourself. It's sort of repetitive. Why don't we just cut one of those? Why don't I say, Look at yourself. It might scare you.' Stone looked at him and calmly replied 'I like mirror. I wrote Scarface. Go fuck yourself.'"
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The twelfth time Sean Stone has appeared in one of his father's movies. He had previously played Gekko's infant son Rudy in the first film, and plays a trader here.
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Carl Quintana and Joe Kernan from CNBC shot scenes for the film, but did not make the final cut.
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Zabel's firm is based on both Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers. Like Bear Stearns CEO Jimmy Cayne, Zabel would threaten to declare bankruptcy only to later acquiesce to the deal. Also like Bear Stearns, Keller Zabel's New York headquarters was worth more than the initial offer of two dollars per share. Finally as was the fate of Keller Zabel, both Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers were allegedly brought down by massive short selling based on rumors of solvency issues due to each company's holdings of toxic mortgage-backed securities.
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Music is used to atmospherically link the movie with Wall Street. Much of the soundtrack of both films is provided by Brian Eno and/or David Byrne of the Talking Heads. In fact the Talking Heads song "This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody)" is used in both films.
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Frank Langella is the third Richard Nixon to work with Oliver Stone. Not only did stone direct Anthony Hopkins in the part of Nixon, but Stone's earlier film also featured Dan Hedaya, who played the role in Dick.
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A photo of Kirk Douglas (Michael Douglas' father) can be seen in the scene at London's tailor. When Gekko is talking through the phone, arranging meetings with high society, the photo appears on the wall behind Gekko's back, apparently in "notable customers" gallery.
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The film's $19.5 million opening weekend gross was a record best for Oliver Stone and his first film since Any Given Sunday to debut number one at the box office.
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Shot in 58 days. Approximately the same shooting schedule the first Wall Street was shot in.
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The fictional oil company Hydra Offshore, "a huge deep-sea exploration play off the coast of Equatorial Guinea", may have been patterned on the real-life company Hyperdynamics, a huge deep-sea exploration play off the coast of the Republic of Guinea.
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The motorcycles uses in the forest race scene are the only Moto GP spec bikes available to consumers. Bretton James rode a Motoczysz C1 and Jake Moore rode a Ducati Desmosedici RR.
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Shia LaBeouf's character Jacob Moore tells Bretton James (Josh Brolin) who is a fellow lover of motorcycle riding, that if James were to ride everyday for the rest of his life, James would still never be as good as Moore. This is based on the initial meeting between Bear Stearns executives Alan 'Ace' Greenberg and Jimmy Cayne. When Cayne was introduced to Greenberg following an interview for a sales position with the firm, Greenberg asked Cayne if he was a bridge player and how well did he play. Cayne responded "Mr. Greenberg, if you study bridge the rest of your life, if you play with the best partners and you achieve your potential, you will never play bridge like I play bridge." Greenberg so admired Cayne's confidence, he hired him on the spot.
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Michael Douglas's Golden Globe nomination marks the first Golden Globe nomination for an Oliver Stone film since Nixon.
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The fusion project depicted in the movie is based on work at the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which Oliver Stone toured during production. The graphics used to show the process are very similar to and derived from animations viewable at the National Ignition Facility website.
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The snowy, winter street scene supposedly depicting Zürich is actually Prague. This same exact scene has been used in other movies.
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In Bretton James's office is a painting of a nurse with a surgical mask. The painting was in Gordon Gekko's house in the first Wall Street movie.
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To help him get into character, Shia LaBeouf chose to stay thin as he had noticed that a lot of hedge funders were physically very slight.
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Shia LaBeouf became so interested in trading that he began studying for his Series 7 Exam, earning his broker's license.
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Oliver Stone originally wanted Carey Mulligan to have long hair in the film and was somewhat dismayed to discover that she had cropped hair in real life. He wanted her to wear a wig but she refused, saying that it would affect her performance. Eventually she was able to persuade him to let her play the part with short hair.
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Cameo
Melissa Lee, Becky Quick, David Faber, Maria Bartiromo, Ron Insana:
Several CNBC personalities make appearances in the film as themselves.
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Anthony Scaramucci:
The writer of 'Goodbye Gordon Gekko', who appears often on CNBC, makes an appearance as an unnamed character.
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Director Trademark
Oliver Stone:
[W]
The third consecutive time that a fiction film released by Stone begins with the letter W (following W. and World Trade Center). All three films are based on historical/political events in the early 21st century.
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Spoilers
The final shot is an echo of the last shot of Wall Street, with the camera rising up above the characters and turning to overlook the Manhattan skyline which then becomes a graphic, while "This is the Place (Naive Melody)" plays on the soundtrack.
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