Christian Bale has said he had to stop talking to Chris Rock on the set of Amsterdam because he was too “bloody funny”.

The Dark Knight actor said he had to start ignoring Rock after he started making him laugh on the set of the David O. Russell film, and Bale found he “couldn’t act”.

“I remember his first day, I was excited to meet him, I’m a big fan of his standup,” Bale told IndieWire. “David [O. Russell] told him to tell me some stories that I didn’t know he was gonna tell me, which is the way David works often. And I was loving it.”

Bale continued: “But Chris is so bloody funny and I found that I couldn’t act, because I was just becoming Christian laughing at Chris Rock. So I had to go to him, I went, ‘Mate, I love talking to you, and we have mutual friends, but I can’t do it anymore. Because David didn’t ask me to make this film so he could just watch me giggle. He wants me to be Burt, and I’m forgetting how to be Burt.’”

Christian Bale plays Burt Berendsen in the period ensemble film, which also stars Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Robert De Niro, Anya Taylor-Joy, Mike Myers, Zoe Saldaña, Taylor Swift and more.

Swift’s role in Amsterdam marks her first acting stint since she appeared as Bombalurina in the live-action version of Cats in 2019. Prior to that, she appeared as Rosemary in 2014’s The Giver and voiced Audrey in 2012’s The Lorax.