The actor has been giving interviews detailing the challenging, day-by-day effort that went into embodying the screen legend. The results have been widely praised, with critics and fans alike stunned by the actor’s uncanny resemblance to Brando, particularly during his “Godfather” era.
Billy Zane as Marlon Brando in Waltzing with Brando (2024)
More Than Makeup: The Daily Grind
Zane’s total immersion into the role required not just acting prowess, but a grueling commitment to the makeup chair. The transformation, which included prosthetics, required up to three-and-a-half hours of application daily. The makeup team meticulously applied a prosthetic nose, covered his tear ducts, and used specialized “jowl plumbers” to achieve the signature thickness and gravity of the Brando brow and jawline. This physical metamorphosis was essential for the film, which features recreations of some of Brando’s most legendary moments, including scenes from The Godfather and Last Tango in Paris.
Brando’s Mindset was the Key
Despite the painstaking external transformation, Zane repeatedly emphasized that the key to his performance was adopting Brando’s legendary, unbothered attitude. Zane said he had to “dispatch with” the daunting responsibility of playing Brando by approaching the character as Brando would have approached a role. By focusing on Brando as a deeply conflicted, yet brilliant man who was trying to reclaim his own legacy, Zane successfully balanced the star’s eccentricities with a touching vulnerability.
Tahiti
Billy Zane and writer/director Bill Fishman attend Billy Zane And Filmmakers Celebrate Opening Night Of “Waltzing with Brando” at Culver Theater on September 19, 2025 in Culver City, California. (Photo by Jon Kopaloff/Getty Images for “Waltzing With Brando”)
The collaboration between Billy Zane and writer/director Bill Fishman on Waltzing with Brando was truly a matter of kismet, or shared fate, centered on this little-known period of Brando’s life. The section of Marlon Brando’s life that most captivated them was the actor’s environmental passion and his unique time spent in Tahiti on his private atoll, Tetiaroa.
