2023-05-30 15:02:17
If we look at the filmography of Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger y Sylvester Stallone, it would not be strange to imagine that they are united by the rivalry to be the definitive action heroes of the 80s and 90s. After all, they were imposing figures of the big screen, with constant exposure in billboards and impossible stories armed to the bars. However, we would be wrong. Because despite the carnal competition that took place at the beginning, in reality, an unbreakable bond unites them that is still latent after learning of the sad diagnosis suffered by the star of Hard to Kill. And not even a dispute for four million dollars would have made it bankrupt.
“I think it’s fantastic,” Schwarzenegger said, remembering Bruce Willis In a recent interview for CinemaBlend. “He was always, for years, a huge, huge star. And I think he will always be remembered as a great star. And a kind man. I understand that under his health circumstances he had to retire. But in general, we never back down. Action heroes reload.”
A sentiment similar to that expressed by Stallone since the family of Bruce Willis announced his professional retirement after being diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia. “Bruce is going through very, very difficult times,” he said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter in November 2022, after announcing that she was praying for him and his “wonderful family” via Instagram. And while she implied that she had not heard from him because Willis was “incommunicado”, assuring that not talking to him “kills me” and that it was a “very sad” situation.
And it is that the relationship between the three comes from afar. Bruce Willis had gained notoriety in the late 1980s as a television actor through Moonlight, precisely in the heyday of cinematography Sylvester Stallone y Arnold Schwarzenegger.
When the rivalry between the two was hotter than ever since Sly had thrown a vase of flowers at him at the 1977 Golden Globes (when he won Best Picture for Rocky). They were, in reality, the kings of the genre sitting on the international throne thanks to Rambo y Cobra, as well as Commando, Conan y Terminator, respectively. They did not mince words when it came to making negative references to each other in interviews, and Schwarzenegger even appealed to rivalry to make his opponent believe that he was interested in the script for Stop or my mom shoots! But only to see him accept a movie that smacked of failure. That’s why, When they heard about the newcomer in the late ’80s, they went to assess the competition.
According to Nick De Semlyen’s book, The Last Action Heroes (via EW), Sylvester Stallone visited the set of Hard to Kill and attended the premiere in Los Angeles to see first-hand the new rival of the genre. While Arnold Schwarzenegger he would have laughed out loud to see it, especially when John McClane exclaimed: ‘They’ve got missiles, automatic weapons and enough plastic explosives to orbit Arnold Schwarzenegger!’
However, the same book adds that they passed each other in a restaurant shortly after the premiere and that, when Willis entered, Arnie yelled at him: “Do you know why you will never be an action star?” And when Bruce asked him for the answer, the movie Terminator flexed his biceps and pointed at him saying “Chopstick arms.”
However, the competition did not last long. Schwarzenegger and Stallone smoked the peace pipe by allowing photographers to catch them dancing together at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival (a strategy later used by Jean-Claude Van Damme), and apparently carried the same sentiment into their newly forged relationship. with Bruce Willis.
Hard to Kill was a genre-redefining hit by bringing a new kind of alternate hero to the muscles of Arnie and Sly. One more credible within the impossible follies of their stories through a mundane aspect, far from the exaggerated caricature that the rest of the physicists provided. In this way, the three discovered that it was possible to coexist without problems within the same genre.. They weren’t going after the same characters and each was able to continue their careers unaffected by the competition. And so, shortly after the premiere of Hard to Kill, they became investors and sponsors of the restaurant chain Planet Hollywood.
They went together to the openings of several establishments and paraded the good relationship before photographers and the press. For example, there is an interview where they are comfortable and relaxed talking about their careers while Schwarzenegger and Willis shared how much fatherhood has changed their perspective. They did not exude any hint of rivalry. Rather the complete opposite.
“All of the characters that we’ve played have been well defined and very definitive. I couldn’t have played the Terminator. I know that. And what Bruce did in Hard to Kill He was also a definitive character,” said Stallone while his companions listened attentively. “They associate him with Rambo but it’s not true, they’re totally different characters. I think we’ve all carved out our niches and they don’t really overlap as much.”
Over the years they shared moments at award ceremonies, premieres, events and up to Stallone’s 60th birthday in 2006. However, in 2013 something unexpected happened. Willis and Schwarzenegger had accompanied Sylvester Stallone in two movies of The indestructibles, his testosterone-intoxicated saga of all modern movie action heroes. But when Sly was preparing the third part, Bruce Willis became “greedy”. According to Stallone’s words.
It was Rocky himself who broke the news, announcing on Twitter (and with all the rabid attention that capital letters command), that Willis was out of the project for “greedy and lazy” pointing it out as “a guaranteed formula for the failure of a career.” Harrison Ford replaced him.
Shortly after, The Hollywood Reporter He assured that a close source had explained that the dispute was due to the economic demands of Bruce Willis. Apparently, he had been offered $3 million to work three consecutive days on the set in Bulgaria. But the actor would have answered that he was leaving the project if they don’t pay him $4 million. That is, a million per day. A demand that Stallone and the production would have rejected.
Obviously, the topic generated countless headlines in 2013. After all, for a star of the magnitude of Sylvester Stallone to resort to such specific adjectives to refer to Bruce Willis, making his departure from the project public, was going to provoke curiosity, interest and conversation. . Even more so when the alleged economic motive was known.
The scandal was inevitable because they were two outstanding stars, and because The indestructibles it was a saga that represented a cinematographic era by bringing together old glories of the genre within the same production. The stories were weak and the action predictable, but its merit was precisely the joint celebration of the heroes of yesteryear. And Bruce Willis entered the package that also included Schwarzenegger, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Mickey Rourke, Chuck Norris and Jean-Claude Van Damme, among others. For this reason, the fact that he was not part of an apparently exorbitant economic request (at least for mere mortals) and with Stallone calling him “greedy” and “lazy”, led to the news going around the world.
However, the years passed and the matter was apparently buried. Or at least that is how the words of Stallone and Schwarzenegger allow it to be glimpsed, sharing the regret of the vital experience that Bruce is living at 68 years of age.
Because in addition to saying that “it kills him” not being able to talk to Willis as a result of his problem, Sylvester Stallone also said to Access Hollywood at the premiere of Tulsa King that the news “brings out the fragility of life and how we should take advantage of every moment. People talk about it, but they never do it. If you are going to say that you love someone, tell them now.” And he concluded by saying that it bothered him “a lot “what his partner is experiencing, remembering that his figure is part of his first years in Hollywood. “I started with him,” he sentenced.
This article was written exclusively for Yahoo en Español by Cine54.
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