by Cary Elwes
Fortunately, everything went smoothly and I was able to put out the fire without too much difficulty each and every take thereafter. I remember Robin’s reaction when the large flame caught on her dress was a very small “Ooh!” rather than a scream, which should tell you just how unfazed she was by it all. Or just how good an actress she was at hiding her fear. As soon as Rob yelled, “Cut,” after each take the FX crew and Peter would rush over and douse her with a small fire extinguisher just to be sure. And she would have to change into a succession of dresses once the burn became noticeable.
WILLIAM GOLDMAN
I remember turning to Rob and saying, “You’re setting fire to Robin on the first day?! What are you nuts? It’s not like we can replace her!”
ROB REINER
We were in the Fire Swamp and shooting the scene where a burst of flame catches Robin’s dress on fire. And Bill was really upset, saying, “I can’t believe that on the first day of shooting we’re setting the leading lady on fire!”
Bill was so embarrassed at having potentially ruined another take he wanted to book his flight home right away, but Rob convinced him to stay longer. He actually made it to the first day of shooting for the Florin Castle sequences at Haddon Hall before packing his things and leaving. The reason I remember is because I brought a video camera to the set that day and shot some behind-the-scenes footage that included him. And then, the very next day, he left. Just like that. The man responsible for creating this wondrous world, this magical story, was gone. Fortunately he would return later.
ROBIN WRIGHT
I remember on one take the dress caught fire, and it kept catching fire. Maybe they forgot to put fire retardant on part of the dress. Anyway, it just kept burning. And thankfully Cary put it out just as it was crawling up toward my hair.
Setting fire to Robin was just the first of a couple of challenging physical sequences to be undertaken in the swamp. Before the day ended, there was another meeting with the FX crew, this time to discuss Buttercup’s disappearance into what looks like quicksand, referred to as “Snow Sand” in the book, and her subsequent rescue by Westley. Again, the entire sequence was explained and demonstrated by the special effects team and by Peter Diamond in a safety meeting. Located just a few inches beneath the quicksand, we were told, was a trapdoor made out of latex and plywood that was being held in place by a member of the FX team. When Buttercup stepped on the appropriate spot at the appropriate time, the door would be released and she would be sucked into the sand. Shortly after she disappeared, I was to jump in after her, using the same technique. Beneath the trapdoor was a pit filled with foam mattresses to ensure that the person falling down would land safely. Peter and the stunt team assured us they would be down there to catch us and make sure we weren’t injured. A marvelous and very effective illusion.
Our doubles, Andy and Sue, began walking us through the stunt effortlessly and safely. As with the fire stunt, they would do one take and then it was to be our turn. In all honesty, this one seemed easy, at least in comparison to the previous stunt. But after watching, there was something about it that seemed a little odd. My initial instructions were to merely walk in after Robin—grab my nose with one hand to prevent sand from getting in it, and jump down feet-first. But when we looked at the scene on playback afterward, it seemed kind of feeble. There was something rather unheroic about jumping into quicksand feet-first. Especially holding one’s nose.
“I don’t know, guys,” I said. “It doesn’t exactly seem swashbuckling, does it? What if I were to dive in headfirst?”
Rob agreed, but both he and the stunt team were reluctant to let me, or anyone, for that matter, dive headfirst into the pit. It was much too dangerous. What if I got injured? It hadn’t really been designed or tested for that purpose, they reasoned quite correctly. I tried to plead my case. What sort of fairy-tale hero would watch his love tumble into a pit of quicksand, and then take the time to place his sword and sheath on the ground and just sort of step casually into the pit to save her?
No one disputed the idea, but there were legitimate safety concerns and insurance issues that had to be considered. The fear, naturally, was that a mistimed headlong dive into the quicksand could result in serious injury (like a broken neck, spinal injury, or fractured skull) and thus, the termination of the entire movie. There was quite a lot at stake. But then, that’s often the case with any special effects or stunt work.
As the relative freshman on the set, it wasn’t easy for me to voice my opinion about something that was not just a matter of safety but also a matter of artistic license. But I instinctively knew that stepping into the quicksand didn’t seem right, that it wasn’t graceful enough to capture the spirit of the story or of the character. I didn’t think Westley was the type of person who would be too timid to dive headfirst into quicksand to save his true love. It didn’t seem true to his nature. I wanted him to be consistent with Goldman’s vision: at once fearless and elegant, romantic and brave. My theory was that if he wasn’t afraid to throttle a giant, wrestle humongous rats, and defeat Inigo Montoya in a duel, he shouldn’t be afraid to dive headlong into quicksand.
“There’s going to be some exciting music here, right?” I asked Rob.
“Yeah, sure.”
“Then let’s give Westley some exciting behavior to go along with it!”
After a lot of beard scratching, Rob finally relented.
“Okay. But not with you, with your stunt double,” was his only concession.
This was a big deal for me—it was the first moment in which I felt like a real collaborator in the process, and not merely a hired hand. I had earned the trust and respect of a director I greatly admired.
I pulled Andy Bradford aside.
“Do you think you can do it?”
“Absolutely,” he said without hesitation. “No problem.” Andy was not someone who showed fear at all.
Peter Diamond then talked Andy through the sequence and how to do it safely. They stood around the pit, miming the dive, discussing proper timing, and then, with the cameras rolling, first Robin disappeared. Then Andy—bless his heart!—after grabbing a piece of vine he had hacked, dove right in after her. He had never practiced the stunt before, and he did it perfectly. The trapdoor opened and he slid smoothly into the sand, looking very heroic in the process.
When he made his way back to the surface with Robin on his back, and using the vine for support, there was big applause from us all. Everyone had become convinced of the merits of diving rather than walking into the quicksand.
“That was great, Andy! Cary, do you think you can do that?” Rob asked excitedly.
“I think so,” I replied.
He then turned to Andy. “Can you show him? That was fantastic!”
Andy spit out a few grains of sand and smiled. “Yeah, sure.”
Unlike Andy, the special effects folks went along reluctantly. They were naturally nervous that the door might not open at the precise moment. Because if it didn’t, I was warned, then I would be smashing my skull against plywood with the full weight of my body.
“Just so you know, guv’nor,” they said to Rob, “we’re not liable. The trapdoor wasn’t intended for this purpose, so we can’t be certain it’ll work a second time.”
Finally, after a practice run with Andy showing me precisely how it was done, it was my turn.
The first AD called, “Turn over,” the camera started rolling, and Rob yelled, “Action!”
I watched as Robin disappeared into the quicksand, then I cut a piece of vine, stuck my sword into the ground, took a deep breath, and dove headfirst into the pit after her, just as Andy had done a few minutes earlier. Fortunately, I slid neatly into the pile of foam and was caught below by a very relieved Peter Diamond and Andy Bradford. And I didn’t get so much as a bump or a bruise.
ANDY SCHEINMAN
It turned out much better. But we were scared Cary was going to die. We didn’t want him to dive into the sand pit. And even though
we rigged this thing with padding, there was cement down there. If he went down and hurt his neck or something, that would have been a disaster. But he did it on the first take, and in the movie it looks fabulous. It definitely helped the movie. It’s way more Errol Flynn-y and hero-y to dive than not to dive.
After ten days of shooting we were all about ready to leave the Fire Swamp, but we still had one more scene left to do. On the second-to-last day, we were introduced to the little people who would be portraying the Rodents of Unusual Size. In the script there is a protracted and exciting fight scene between Westley and an R.O.U.S. in the Fire Swamp. As opposed to the CGI miracles prevalent in movies today, we only had a budget that provided for small people wearing rat costumes. One of the little people, Danny Blackner, was from the north of England and had multiple tattoos and earrings all up and down his ears long before it became fashionable, and he looked like a guy who had sprung from the punk rock scene of the late 1970s. I was told that besides being a performer he was also a veteran stuntman, having utilized his skills and diminutive stature to land work in films such as Labyrinth and Return of the Jedi, in which he played an Ewok. He was an intensely spirited and joyful guy who clearly liked his work.
There were three actors playing R.O.U.S. in all, but Danny was appointed to be the one who would do much of the heavy lifting, and the one I would wrestle with over the course of the next two days. It was no picnic for these guys in the rat suits. First, they were encased in fifty pounds of latex, rubber, and fake fur—roughly half their own body weight. Second, they’d have to use their hands to control the front feet of the rat and their legs to sort of kick with the rear feet in order to maneuver. And third, their vision would be extremely limited.
“This is going to be kind of strange,” Peter Diamond explained. “When you fight with them, you’ll be using this retractable sword,” he said handing it to me, “and Danny is going to pretend to bite you. But don’t worry, the teeth are all rubber. It’s all fake. Now, the challenge is that Danny won’t be able to see much of anything through the suit, so you’re going to have to make him move while you’re fighting with him. He won’t have much of a clue about what’s going on.”
“Really?”
“Not much, no,” Peter responded.
I looked over at Danny, who was still being sewn into his rat costume. He gave me a huge grin and a thumbs-up.
“Just remember, these suits are not very comfortable; it’s very hot in there for him. We don’t want this to drag on for too long, so try to get it over with as quickly as possible, okay?”
“Sure. No problem.”
Since it was getting late, it was decided that we should just rehearse the fight sequence in preparation to shoot it the following morning. So we practiced the wrestling and the bite on the shoulder over and over. We’d always check on the guys inside the R.O.U.S. costumes every few minutes to make sure they weren’t percolating. They wore only T-shirts and boxers, but they’d still be drenched with sweat whenever we took a break and they were allowed to remove their giant rat heads.
“You okay in there?” I asked Danny after one rehearsal.
“Yeah, fine, guv’nor,” came the usual muffled refrain.
It had to have been sweltering for those guys inside those costumes. There were giant lights illuminating the soundstage, and no air-conditioning that I can recall. I had already soaked through Westley’s billowy black shirt, just because of the action under the bright lights, so I can only imagine how unbearable it must have been inside the skin of a 50-pound latex-and-fur-covered R.O.U.S. But there weren’t any complaints from the guys in the suits. I won’t lie to you, though: as I rolled around on the floor of the swamp, staring into the rubber face of a giant rat, I did find myself thinking, Gosh, I hope this all works out. I mean, the R.O.U.S. didn’t really look all that much like fearsome creatures to begin with. Up close, they looked like what they were: little people inside rat suits.
I could only hope that no one would care, that somehow the special effects would seem charming rather than cheesy (which was, thankfully, exactly the way it turned out).
The next day, our final day in the swamp, I arrived on the set to find what appeared to be a large commotion going on. Rob and Andy were in a serious conference with the ADs and David Barron, our production manager. I approached to inquire what all the fuss was about.
“We lost one of the R.O.U.S.,” Rob said.
“What? What happened?” I asked, fearing the worst—maybe an accident or something.
“It’s the guy you are supposed to fight with today, Danny. We can’t find him.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, we can’t finish the sequence without him.”
“Can’t one of the other guys take his place?”
“No,” Andy chimed in, “he’s the only trained stuntman. He’s the only one qualified to fight with you. It’s a union thing.”
David Barron looked at his watch.
“If he’s not here in the next ten minutes,” he said to Rob, “we may have to break for lunch and try and complete this later on.”
“But this is our last day on this set. What if he doesn’t show?” Rob asked.
“Well, then, I suggest we figure out an alternative,” David responded.
After some more consultation with Rob, Andy, and the other ADs, it was finally decided that we would have to make do with me wrestling a stuffed rat—the same one that was thrown at me from off camera by Peter Diamond after my line, “Rodents of Unusual Size? I don’t think they exist.” Believe me when I tell you that wrestling a “rubber rat” felt even sillier than wrestling a little person inside a rat suit. Even Robin was barely able to stifle a laugh during some of the takes.
ROB REINER
The whole thing was a big challenge. We didn’t have a big budget—only 16 million bucks. So that was a challenge, just to get all of it done. But the biggest challenge was to strike the right balance in the tone. To be reverent to the genre, but at the same time to be gently satirizing it, which is what we did. To walk that line was tricky. But we had the right people to do it.
ANDY SCHEINMAN
Truthfully, I was a little worried that the Rodents of Unusual Size looked a little corny or weird. But it didn’t matter because it was all in the spirit of the film. I don’t see Rob as a big techno guy. He’s more human. And by that I mean he’s more interested in the human end of filmmaking, you know? If we had CGI back then, it’s possible the story would have gotten overwhelmed by all that stuff.
After shooting what seemed an endless amount of footage of this foolishness (that no one was buying—not even Rob, despite all his positive feedback) word came that Danny had finally arrived on set. We all stopped what we were doing to go and make sure he was all right. There was no question that he was looking a little bedraggled. Now, based on the costly delay, some directors might have sent him packing, or at least given him a good tongue lashing, but not Rob. Compassionate to the core, he reached instead for a logical response.
“How are you? Are you all right?” Rob asked him sincerely.
“I am now,” came the reply.
“What the heck happened to you? We were all worried!”
This opened the door for Danny to embark on an extraordinary tale that stopped production in its tracks for the next few minutes.
“Well, guv’nor, it’s like this, you see. I had a bit of a rough night . . . a really rough night, actually.”
Rob nodded sympathetically and leaned forward. They made quite a pair—Danny, at four feet tall, and Rob more than six feet, with his broad shoulders and thick beard.
Danny hung his head shamefully and went on.
“So I went out to the pub last night with my mates, right? And we tied a few ones on, same as usual. And anyway, when it was time to go home, I got in my special car, you see—”
“A special car?” Rob interjected.
“You know—a car that’s specially made for me. See, my feet ca
n’t reach the floor of a regular car. I can’t use the pedals. So I’ve got a car that’s adjusted for me, so I can drive it with me hands.”
By now the whole crew had gathered around. Hanging on every word.
“Well, anyway, such is my luck, I got pulled over, didn’t I?”
Rob, of course, asked, “For what?”
“For speeding! Course I wasn’t speeding at all ’cos my car can only go so fast, you know.”
Rob shook his head out of concern, but some of the crew couldn’t help chuckling a little.
“But this copper, he’s got another idea. So he pulls me over, knocks on the window, and tells me to get out the vehicle. So I hop off me pile of books—’cos I use a stack of books to get the right height. And I jump out of the car, and I’m a bit wobbly, I won’t lie to you. So the policeman, he says to me, ‘License and registration.’ So I give it to him and he says, ‘Do you realize what you were doing?’ And I says, ‘No, what was I doing?’ And he goes, ‘You were over the speed limit.’ Then he asks me what’s the deal with my car, and he wants to know who I am and all that, right? So just as I start to tell him, he cuts me off and says, ‘Hold on! Let me smell your breath!’ So I give him a quick whiff and he says, ‘You’ve been drinking, haven’t you?’ And I says, ‘Yeah, I’ve had a couple.’ And he says, ‘Right, then! Back of the van for you!’ ”
By this time most of the crew were trying hard not to laugh at this poor guy’s misfortune. But Rob remained calm and composed. I think he just wanted to hear the end of the story.
