Aaron Sorkin once became so involved in a writing session for The Newsroom that he ended up in the emergency room. The screenwriter recently revisited the unusual accident and explained exactly how he broke his nose. Apparently, Sorkin’s habit of physically acting out scenes went a little too far. This time, a bathroom mirror stood directly in his path.
Aaron Sorkin recalls smashing into a mirror while acting out a scene for The Newsroom
During an appearance on The Daily Show, Aaron Sorkin told host Michael Kosta how a The Newsroom scene sent him to the emergency room. The moment involved Will McAvoy, played by Jeff Daniels, lunging toward another character.
Sorkin wanted two other characters to hold Will back during the scene. However, while writing alone at home, he decided to act out the movement himself. “I was very excited about this and I was acting it out,” Sorkin recalled, according to TheWrap. He eventually wandered into his bathroom while performing the scene.
Then came the problem. Nobody was actually there to stop him. Sorkin lunged forward and smashed his face directly into the mirror. The impact broke his nose and left him bleeding heavily. Still, the injury apparently did not immediately shift his attention away from the script. Sorkin called a friend to come over, and she quickly told him they needed to visit the emergency room. Instead, he first asked her to read what he had written because he still thought the scene was funny.
Sorkin also joked that even Martin Scorsese might have considered the moment excessive. He imagined the filmmaker asking for another take with “less blood.” The writer first revealed the broken-nose story in 2011. A year later, he explained that he often performs every character while writing. That habit ultimately turned this particular The Newsroom scene into a real accident.
Meanwhile, Sorkin has recently been revisiting plenty of stories from his career while promoting The Social Reckoning. He also opened up about Jesse Eisenberg declining to return for the new film.
Years later, the broken nose remains one of Sorkin’s strangest writing stories. Few screenwriters can say finishing a television scene required a trip to the emergency room.
