You can’t believe everything you read on IMDb, especially in movie trivia sections. But every now and then, the fans get it right. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Naked Gun star Liam Neeson was asked to confirm this bit of Neeson minutiae: “He recalled his most embarrassing moment in acting as when he auditioned for the role of Fezzik, the giant in The Princess Bride. Director Rob Reiner had a look of disgust on his face when he realized that Neeson was only 6-foot-4”
“It’s very true,” confirmed Neeson.
What made the audition so humiliating? Blame Reiner, who barely gave Neeson the time of day. Instead, he turned to his casting director and said, “I asked for a giant.” Back to Neeson: “What height are you?”
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Six-foot-four was Neeson’s response. Pretty tall for, say, a Cracked writer, but hardly giant status.
“Come on!” an exasperated Reiner told the casting director. And Neeson was dismissed before he uttered a line of dialogue. “That was it,” Neeson recalled. “No ‘Hello, thanks for coming.’ Nothing.”
Ever the gentleman, Neeson saved his pity for the casting director. “I felt bad for her,” he said. “I really did.”
Did Reiner actually expect to find a real giant? The director told Rich Eisen about the difficulty of casting the part in 2017. “It’s not like you throw a stick and you hit 50 giants,” he said. “You know, it’s not a heck of a lot to choose from.”
It was screenwriter William Goldman who suggested the professional wrestler Andre the Giant (heck, the job description was in the guy’s name), and Reiner immediately agreed he’d be perfect. However, the challenge was then finding the 7-foot-4 performer. “He’s traveling all over the world,” Reiner recalled. “We’re calling Vince McMahon, trying to get him.”
Finally, on a location scouting trip to find the Cliffs of Insanity, Reiner and company got a call about meeting the behemoth in Paris. They flew there immediately, and the hotel manager told Reiner a man was waiting for him in the lounge. “We walk into the bar,” Reiner said, “and there’s a landmass sitting on a barstool.”
Andre the Giant’s audition wasn’t much better than Neeson’s. He performed the Fezzik character from a three-page script, and “I didn’t understand a word he said,” confessed Reiner. Could the wrestler handle all the dialogue? “I said, you know, Andre, this is a big part. You’re gonna be here for 15 weeks.”
“I do it, boss,” grunted the Giant.
“So I made a tape,” Reiner said. “He listened to the tape, and he did it. I didn’t have to loop it or anything.”
Forget 6-foot-4 pretenders like Neeson. “It was Andre,” Reiner said, “and the rest was history.”
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