Trivia / Eastern Promises

• The Cast Showoff: The scene where Semyon demonstrates his musical skills to the little girls was not dubbed. Armin Mueller-Stahl does play the violin in real life, and was a noted concert violinist in his youth.
• The Danza: Probably unintentional, but Tatiana's narration is done by Tatiana Maslany
• Fake Nationality: Azim the Turk was played by an Egyptian-born actor, the Chechen assassins were played by a Georgian and a Turkish Cypriot, and the Ukranian prostitute was played by a Czech actress.
• Fake Russian: Almost none of the Russian characters are played by Russian actors. The cast includes a Danish-American (Nikolai's Viggo Mortensen), a Frenchman (Kirill's Vincent Cassel), a German (Semyon's Armin-Mueller Stahl), and a Pole (Stepan's Jerzy Skolimowski). Anna, half-English and half-Russian, is played by the British-Australian Naomi Watts.
• Hide Your Pregnancy: Naomi Watts discovered she was pregnant with her son Alexander two weeks into shooting this movie. She initially tried to hide it, but costume designer Denise Cronenberg found out about it.
• Method Acting: Viggo Mortensen attempted to stay in character and keep his character's tattoos on even when not filming. He quickly had to abandon this plan after going into a restaurant to eat and realizing just how terrified people were just by his appearance. Afterwards, he made sure to thoroughly wash the tattoos off at the end of every shooting day.
• No Stunt Double: For the bathhouse fight scene, the scene was choreographed with the actors instead of stuntmen. The actors had to train in specific fighting styles chosen for their characters and it took two days to shoot on location in London. According to the DVD Commentary, both Viggo Mortensen and David Cronenberg agreed that Nikolai had to fight his would-be killers completely nude.
• Stillborn Franchise: A sequel was written, set to begin production in 2013, with Viggo Mortensen and probably Vincent Cassel reprising their roles, but it was canceled by the CEO of Focus Features. David Cronenberg maintains that budget was the primary issue, and that large portions of the story took place in Russia.
• What Could Have Been:
  • In the original script, Nikolai revealed himself to Anna as a double agent, and Tatiana's baby, Christina, was sent to live with her grandmother.
  • Kirill was named Petrid in an earlier draft.
• Word of God: According to David Cronenberg, the attackers in the sauna fight are using linoleum knives because they have a specific professional purpose. If the mooks are ever caught with a linoleum knife on their person, they can claim to be linoleum cutters as an excuse, however flimsy.

---