![]() ![]() There were cables on the actor so Arnold is not the one holding him.Īustralian actor, Vernon Wells, played the villain Bennett. So the next day there was a giant crane on the set. A weight is straight up, I can’t hang there for hours and then hold him over a cliff.’ I said ‘Oh my god! I don’t know what we are going to do.’ I quickly called the studio. I purposely cast a really small tiny guy so you can hold him over the ledge.’ He said, ‘This is not real life. He says, ‘I can’t carry him across the road holding him.” I said, ‘But you lift weights and he is like 160 pounds. Because Arnold was a body builder, Lester assumed he would have no problem holding actor David Patrick Kelly as he does in the movie: One area where Lester over-estimated Schwarzenegger’s abilities was his strength. Lester said he got along very well with his star and recognized immediately that Schwarzenegger had a gift for comedy. Arnold Schwarzenegger – Commando – 1985Ĭommando was directed by Mark Lester who had directed the Stephen King movie, Firestarter, the year before. De Souza said he offered to do the same thing for Jean-Claude Van Damme on Street Fighter, but the Muscles from Brussels turned him down. De Souza later repeated this process with Arnold when he starred in The Running Man. If they found a line that Schwarzenegger struggled to pronounce, they replaced it. So de Souza offered to go over the script with him. Schwarzenegger was still struggling with English at the time. I was like, ‘Wait a minute, I haven’t even thought this through!’ And they told me, ‘Just improvise, you do it all the time in television!’ So we went over to Arnold’s office, and I somehow told him the story of the revised script that hasn’t been written yet. De Souza objected, but the studio wanted to meet with Schwarzenegger anyway: Diller wanted the movie ready in October and a writer’s strike was looming. They liked his ideas and insisted that they meet with Schwarzenegger right away. Arnold Schwarzenegger – Commando – 1985ĭe Souza described the changes he had in mind to the studio. Because according to de Souza, the character in Commando could just go buy guns. He also did away with scenes of Schwarzenegger’s character improvising weapons like Kyle Reese in The Terminator. De Souza moved it up to the beginning so the movie could get right to the action. Additionally, the kidnapping in the original script didn’t take place until halfway through the movie. But there was some doubt about whether or not the former bodybuilder was up to the challenge of romantic scenes. Originally, Schwarzenegger’s character had a wife who was also kidnapped. The first thing De Souza was asked to change was the lead character’s family status. So the studio started pulling any scripts that could possibly be reworked with Schwarzenegger as the lead. Diller told studio president Lawrence Gordon that he wanted a vehicle for Schwarzenegger that could be ready for a fall release with a $10 million dollar budget. After meeting Schwarzenegger at a party, the new studio chief was impressed with Arnold and wanted to make a movie with him. Arnold Schwarzenegger – Commando – 1985Įarly in 1985, Barry Diller had just been hired as the head of 20th Century Fox. The duo’s next assignment was writing the comedy Teen Wolf which was released before Commando despite being written after it. Even though the movie that got made was nothing like the script they had written, Commando landed Loeb and Weisman their next screen-writing gig. When Schwarzenegger was cast, Steven E de Souza was brought on board to punch up the action. When Simmons passed, Nick Nolte was considered for the part. Loeb and Weisman wrote their script with Kiss front-man Gene Simmons in mind. ![]() This was about a guy who’d been an Israeli soldier, who’d actually turned his back on violence. Loeb and Weisman’s original script was a much more realistic take on an aging soldier. After graduating from film school, Loeb and his writing partner, Matthew Weisman collaborated on their first script which would eventually become Commando. But Jeph Loeb, co-writer of Commando, did things in reverse. The comic book industry is filled with writers who would rather be writing movies. To celebrate Commando‘s 30th anniversary, let’s take a look at some totally awesome facts you need to know. With Commando, which was released 30 years ago today, Arnold proved he was a legitimate threat to the Italian Stallion’s reign. Former body builder Arnold Schwarzenegger had made the leap to the big screen with Conan the Barbarian and The Terminator. But there was a challenger who was making a name for himself. Stallone starred in the second and third highest-grossing movies of the year Rambo: First Blood Part II and Rocky IV. In 1985, the reigning king of action movies was Sylvester Stallone. ![]()
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