Aaron Sorkin just shut down the biggest rumor about The Social Reckoning and revealed what Sony’s lawyers forced him to change. The writer-director addressed the film’s reshoots, secretive test screenings and surprising legal edits ahead of its Oct. 9 release.
Aaron Sorkin explains why The Social Reckoning underwent reshootsAaron Sorkin recently addressed several topics surrounding The Social Reckoning in an interview with Vanity Fair, ahead of the film’s Oct. 9 release. The writer-director discussed the reshoots, limited test screenings and legal edits that shaped the final cut.
Sorkin confirmed the reshoots were not a response to the trailer’s mixed reception. Sony Pictures chairman and CEO Tom Rothman simply asked if he wanted to revisit anything. “Yeah, I would go back and rewrite and reshoot the whole thing,” Sorkin said. He then clarified only two scenes needed work. “And so he opened the checkbook and gave us three days of shooting.”
He further distinguished the nature of the reshoots. “We weren’t correcting anything,” he said. “There are two kinds of reshoots: one is the ‘Oh, we’re in trouble. We need to reshoot this.’ And that usually happens on $150 million superhero movies. The other kinds of reshoots are ‘Oh, we really like this movie. It’s good. Let’s make it better.'”
Sorkin also revealed legal constraints shaped certain scenes. Sony hired an outside legal firm specifically for this film. One scene originally had a senior Facebook official calling an ex-employee “a b—h.” However, the lawyer intervened. “Unless you can show me that at one point a senior Facebook executive referred to an ex-employee as a b—h, you can’t do that,” Sorkin recalled.
Additionally, Bill Burr’s character had to be renamed. The character was originally based on early Facebook investor Roger McNamee. Legal concerns about depicting McNamee’s interactions with Zuckerberg forced Sorkin to make the character merely “inspired by” McNamee.
Regarding test screenings, secrecy drove the studio’s approach. Each screening involved just 70 Sony employees on the studio lot. “It is not a great polling sample,” Sorkin acknowledged.
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