5 Ridiculous On-Set Movie Injuries Actors Had To Deal With
Unless said production contains the words “Jack” and/or “Ass,” no one should have to suffer physical pain in any way while making a movie. That being said, injuries do sometimes happen on film sets – especially if the film set in question is being run by John Landis or the Resident Evil guy. And while most of these stories are huge downers and even horribly tragic at times, it turns out that a tiny fraction of movie-related injuries are amusingly ridiculous in hindsight, such as how …
Miles Teller Discovered Jet Fuel In His Blood While Making Top Gun: Maverick
Making any Tom Cruise movie seems like a dangerous proposition, what with all the death-defying stunts and apple boxes lying around the set. The recent smash hit sequel/remake/propaganda piece, Top Gun: Maverick, actually put its actors in real fighter jets, seemingly because Cruise hates computer trickery almost as much as he hates couches and antidepressants.
This devotion to realism led to not only a veritable sea of movie star vomit but also a trip to the doctor for Miles Teller, who plays Goose's son Rooster. According to Teller, after one flight, he felt "really hot" and "started itching like crazy" – at which point he noticed that he was covered in hives from "head to toe." Tests revealed that Teller had "flame-retardant, pesticides, and jet fuel" in his blood. Which, we have to point out, couldn't have happened if he shot his scenes from the comfort of a green-lined gymnasium.
When Teller told Cruise that he had jet fuel in his blood, the former Mummy star replied: "Yeah, I was born with it, kid," presumably before high-fiving an American flag and riding into the sunset on a motorcycle made of dynamite..
Wayne's World is arguably one of the greatest comedies of all time (and inarguably the greatest to feature both Rob Lowe and the T-1000). Perhaps the most memorable scene of the entire movie is the moment in which Wayne, Garth, and their cronies headbang to "Bohemian Rhapsody," thus securing Mike Myers' baffling future cameo in the biopic of the same name.
Sadly, this classic scene took a substantial toll on its actors; according to director Penelope Spheeris, she shot a "lot of takes." With five actors in one car, she "had to keep moving cameras around," which necessitated them "doing that headbanging thing over and over again." At one point, Myers said that his neck was "killing" him and told Spheeris, "I think we've got enough footage on this particular scene." She didn't agree, so he popped some Advil and kept going.
And while they were playing characters in their early 20s, Myers and Dana Carvey were significantly older – Carvey was 36 at the time and called the four-hour shoot "brutal." Myers claims that he still has neck pains which he attributes to filming that scene. Although it could have been worse, he could have permanently injured his body by headbanging to the music-like wails of Axl Rose, which the studio initially pushed Myers to use instead of Queen.
Cary Elwes Was Knocked Out For Real MakingSince the use of real giant mutant rats was off the table, you'd think that Rob Reiner's classic family adventure movie The Princess Bride would be a pretty safe set to work on. But one predicament that befalls our hero Westley actually happened to actor Cary Elwes for real (thankfully, it wasn't being tortured by a leper).
During the scene in which Prince Humperdinck's men capture Princess Buttercup and Westley, the evil six-fingered Count Rugen knocks our hero out cold.
Rugen is, of course, played by comedy legend Christopher Guest, who at first wasn't being forceful enough with his blow for Elwes to react properly. So, according to Elwes, he asked Guest to crank it up to 11 – unfortunately, the blow "landed a touch harder" than they expected, and Elwes actually lost consciousness and later woke up in the emergency room getting stitches in his head. Which, you have to imagine, is not what he would have wished.
Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory – “Wonka Wash” Gave All The Actors Horrible Rashes
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is the classic story of an orphan who inherits a confectionary factory that has defiantly disregarded any and all safety precautions and labor laws – and then added “child proprietor” to its list of grievances. Well, it turns out that the film production itself was nearly as slapdash and hazardous as its subject.
For the scene in which Charlie, his Grandpa, and several sadly doomed souls travel through the soapy “Wonka Wash” –
– in order to create the necessary suds, the filmmakers used … not soap? Really? Yeah, for some reason, to get that authentic soap look, the actors were slathered in fire extinguisher foam. Which, and we can’t stress this enough, is not soap. Reportedly the foam was a “potent skin irritant,” and the cast required “several days” of medical treatment. Apparently, you just can’t make a classic Hollywood family picture without toxifying the skin of several actors.
Halle Berry Nearly Choked To Death Filming A James Bond Sex Scene
Sex with James Bond obviously carries with it a number of risks ranging from being collateral damage in an enemy attack to contradicting every STI known to science. But apparently filming these scenes isn’t always a walk in the park, either. While making Die Another Day, the movie in which Bond parasurfs through a tsunami –
– Oscar-winner Halle Berry had to film a scene in which her character Jinx has sex with Bond while also eating – because, by this point in the franchise, 007 was clearly verging into George Costanza territory.
Somehow this dumb scene in this dumb movie almost turned fatal, when Berry “nearly choked to death on a fig.” According to Pierce Brosnan, she suddenly went silent and started “waving her arms.” He was just about to attempt the Heimlich manoeuver when “somehow she expelled the fruit,” saving her from a tragic fate that, on the upside, would have included never seeing Die Another Day.
Thumbnail: 20th Century Studios