Ron Howard filming disrupted by snakes

Ron Howard had to pause 'Eden' filming to "transport" snakes off the set.

The 70-year-old director hired animal experts to look for the reptiles while shooting his latest movie - which is based on a true story and follows three parties who flee post-World War I civilisation to start again on the Galapagos Islands - and occasionally had to stop work in order to get the reptiles moved away from where they were shooting so none of the cast or crew came to any harm.

He told Deadline: "We had to deal with animals. We had snake wranglers. And hour before we shot, they came and started looking for the poisonous snakes. And they kept looking all day long and they found a lot of them.

"Sometimes we’d have to stop if they were too close, before they could catch them and very humanely transport them to a safe place. But we were shooting in Queensland, in areas where it’s pretty infested with poisonous insects and snakes."

Stars Jude Law and Vanessa Kirby were keen to sleep on the set but were not allowed because of the creatures dwelling there.

Ron added: "Jude Law and Vanessa Kirby were so dedicated.... They wanted to actually live where the Ritters lived, on that set.

"And the only problem is that when the company left, the Creatures of the Night would move in, and there was no way we could allow them to be there on their own. I had to talk them off of that one."

Meanwhile, the former 'Happy Days' actor explained it is important for him to be "changeable" in his work.

He said: "I want to be changeable, always. If you look at my filmography, the one thing that you could say is, well, here’s somebody who didn’t want to do the same thing over and over again.

"Maybe I had done that as an actor on a TV series, but for me, it’s also my nature.

"These filmmaking experiences, they get me out of the house. They get me into the world. I

"’m not necessarily a person who would be hiking, climbing, diving, going weightless, without these movies, nor would I be necessarily learning as much as I learned by making them. And again, also this extension into the documentaries, which I found I really, really love."