Hollywood has a new leading man, and apparently, he can dance his way into a nightmare. Tom Rhys Harries has made quite the impression as Matt Hagen in Clayface, DC’s R-rated descent into disfigurement, experimental nanotechnology, and unsettling practical-effects looks. But amid all that bodily ruin, it is Harries’ club-dancing scene that is turning heads, and its origins involve a pitch he suspected James Watkins might promptly bury.

As Harries reveals the story behind the scene, it turns out that even in Gotham, a little creative nerve goes a long way.

How Tom Rhys Harries’ Clayface dance started with a risky pitch

Speaking to Metro Entertainment, Tom Rhys Harries revealed that his nightclub sequence in Clayface nearly began with an idea he expected director James Watkins to squash. The actor had a particular vision for Matt Hagen’s frantic dancing, but the timing could hardly have been more nerve-racking. He pitched the idea just before the cameras were due to roll, leaving little room for a graceful retreat.

Rather than shutting down the suggestion, James Watkins gave Tom Rhys Harries the freedom to run with it. The result was a chaotic, identity-swapping dance that captured Matt Hagen’s increasingly fractured sense of self as his body began betraying him. With the character hurtling towards a grotesque transformation, the sequence traded conventional choreography for something far more unpredictable, unsettling, and delightfully unhinged.

In his conversation with Metro Entertainment, Harries discussed how the freedom to experiment helped shape the scene, allowing physical performance to do much of the storytelling. The sequence stands apart from Clayface’s elaborate prosthetics and practical makeup effects by making the actor’s movements central to the horror. As Matt Hagen loses control of his changing body, even a nightclub dance becomes a wonderfully strange glimpse into his unraveling identity.

But the dance was only part of Harries’ charm, as he won over James Gunn and audiences by sneaking in telling details about Matt Hagen into the performance.

The range Tom Rhys Harries brought to Matt Hagen

Tom Rhys Harries gives Matt Hagen far more than a spectacular physical transformation in Clayface, building a portrait of a man losing pieces of himself long before his face completely falls apart. As Hagen retreats into Gotham’s rundown Narrows, Harries reintroduces traces of his character’s rougher local accent, drawing on his own experience of slipping back into his native Cardiff dialect when returning home.

That attention to detail extends to the film’s most stomach-churning moments, particularly when Hagen desperately tries to repair his melting eyes with scissors in an airplane bathroom. Harries leaned into the tactile horror of working with practical prosthetics, while drawing inspiration from The Elephant Man, Taxi Driver, and the Arkham Asylum graphic novel, making the dance scene just an addition to the range he brought to Matt Hagen.

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