29 Classic Comedies That Are Even Funnier When You Know These Behind-The-Scenes Facts
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
1.In Zoolander, Ben Stiller had actually forgotten his line after JP Prewitt explained why he was using male models, so he just repeated his last line again. The actor playing Prewitt, David Duchovny, ad-libbed a reply, and the exchange ended up in the film.
2.Matthew McConaughey really was high in Dazed and Confused when his character says "watch the leather, man" and starts cracking up because he's high. Also, it's a real joint — just for that take.
3.In the Anchorman scene where Ron wanders the streets, drinking milk, Will Ferrell improvised the "milk was a bad choice" — because it was exactly what he was thinking. "He’s sitting there with a carton of milk — we’re shooting in San Pedro and it’s hotter than hell — and Will just said it for real. It’s perfect, because it was an honest moment from the human Will Ferrell speaking through Ron Burgundy," David Koechner revealed.
4.In Free Guy, star Ryan Reynolds suggested the scene and line where two little girls are playing Free City 2 in Free Guy and say of Guy, ‘He’s just an NPC — waste that motherf—." Director Shawn Levy shot it with his two daughters in their bedroom after the rest of the shoot was complete.
5.In Trainwreck, it was Daniel Radcliffe's idea for his character to walk dogs using a leash that attached to his waist — he'd seen someone doing the same on the West Side Highway and thought it was funny. This, of course, spurred those famous paparazzi photos of Radcliffe with a million dogs.
6.Amy Poehler wrote Kevin G's rap in Mean Girls and even coached him on delivery and choreography.
Paramount Pictures
You can watch Amy, Tina, and LiLo do the rap here.
7.In Wedding Crashers, the painting Todd gives Jeremy was originally supposed to be "mutilated genitalia" — it was Owen Wilson's last-minute idea to change it to Vince as Eve in the garden of Eden. Everyone thought it was hilarious, so the props department painted it overnight...and it ended up becoming one of the most iconic parts of the film.
8.One of the classic gags in Monty Python and the Holy Grail is that the characters aren't actually on horses, but bang coconuts together to make it sound as if they are. This idea came from Michael Palin, who thought of it because they genuinely couldn't afford horses for the film
EMI Films
9.Also in Monty Python, there's a moment so funny that even the actors had trouble keeping a straight face. When Sir Bedevere asks why witches burn and John Cleese doesn't answer for many seconds, you can spot Eric Idle biting his scythe to keep from laughing.
10.In The 40-Year-Old Virgin, they really were waxing Steve Carrel's chest in the famous waxing scene. Everyone's reactions were genuine — including Carrel's. Also, Paul Rudd suspects the person waxing Steve had never done it before.
Universal Pictures
11.Michael McDonald insisted on Melissa McCarthy throwing a real phone book in The Heat, and said he would dodge it if it came near his face. But McCarthy ended up being positioned closer than he'd thought, and he didn't have time to dodge, meaning he was hit directly in the face.
20th Century Fox
12.If you look closely in Napoleon Dynamite during the classic "chatting with babes online" scene, you'll see that Jon Heder is wearing a wedding ring. Heder realized this right after the wide shot and quickly told director Jared Hess...who didn't care at all.
13.One of the most iconic lines in When Harry Met Sally... is when a woman who overhears Sally faking an orgasm says, "I'll have what she's having!" The woman was none other than director Rob Reiner's mom!
Columbia Pictures
In fact, to get Ryan to make the right noises, Reiner also demonstrated a bunch of orgasm noises...in front of his mom.
Columbia Pictures
14.Also in When Harry Met Sally..., the scene with the pecan pie line in the Metropolitan Museum of Art was improvised, which is why Meg Ryan looks to the side (at director Rob Reiner) — however, she ends up going with it.
15.The scene in Mrs. Doubtfire where Daniel sticks his face in a cake to avoid being recognized was planned — but the crew didn't realize the heat from the lighting would melt the frosting, causing it to fall into Mrs. Sellner's tea.
20th Century Fox
16.In the beginning scene of 22 Jump Street, when Schmidt is attacked by a bird, Jonah Hill's reaction was authentic — he really is terrified of birds.
Sony Pictures Releasing/Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
17.A classic She's the Man scene is when Viola pretends her tampons are for nosebleeds — then sticks one in her nose. And then later in the film, Duke actually does use it for his nose bleeding. Well, for Channing Tatum's She's the Man audition, when he stuck a tampon up his nose for the scene, he stuck it up there plastic applicator and all, as he didn't know that part came off.
18.Costar Hank Azaria revealed that Robin Williams' fall in The Birdcage was accidental. "If you watch that little piece of film again, you'll see me laughing and Robin laughing. It's one of those things that happens that you never really think they're going to use, but I was so emotionally upset in the scene — I was supposed to be crying — that I just pretended that he was making me cry even more. But I was actually laughing."
MGM/UA Distribution Co.
You can actually see Azaria smile at the very end of this gif, and if you watch the clip, you can hear Williams laugh in his line directly after.
19.In the Bridesmaids scene where Melissa McCarthy's character won't stop flirting with a guy she suspects to be an air marshal, the guy was played by McCarthy's actual husband, Ben Falcone.
20.In Clueless, Alicia Silverstone actually thought "Haitians" was pronounced that way, and the director, Amy Heckerling, thought it was so funny that she declined to correct her.
21.In Clerks, Jeff Anderson refused to list pornographic titles in front of child actor Ashley Pereira and the actor playing her mother. This is why you can't see them in the shot — however, the two of them were later read the lines by someone else for reaction shots.
22.The "Old Time Rock & Roll" dance scene in Risky Business was also largely improvised by Tom Cruise — the script originally just said "Joel dances in underwear through the house."
Warner Bros.
23.Jon Heder didn't have a choreographer for Napoleon's famous dance scene — he "winged it" and then they cut together three different versions of his dance.
Fox Searchlight Pictures / Paramount Pictures