The Expendables 3 hits theaters this weekend, ending a trilogy of films that reveals how yesterday's action stars put away their competitiveness to star in a big movie together. It didn't used to be that way: Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, members of the Action Hero Hall Of Fame, co-owned the eighties, and each of them battled for supremacy, even if it meant taking the next "hot project" despite the fact that it looked like a career death sentence.
In an interview with Jimmy Fallon, Sylvester Stallone claimed that it was Arnold Schwarzenegger who pushed him to take on the most dubious roles, fare like Stop Or My Mom Will Shoot. Click to the 2:00 mark, though you'll want to hear Stallone discuss auditioning for Han Solo before that.
Stallone's two examples of projects that Schwarzenegger would have done were Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot and Rhinestone. Rhinestone happened in 1984, in the same year Schwarzenegger was doing The Terminator and Conan The Destroyer. Does it really seem like Schwarzenegger would have passed on either of those two movies to do a Dolly Parton musical? Can you even imagine Schwarzenegger singing? How bad was Stallone's management that they thought Schwarzenegger would be great in a Dolly Parton musical? And does Stallone really believe that Commando was Schwarzenegger's answer to Rambo? Well, actually, that theory's not that bad.
As for Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot, that would have been Schwarzenegger coming off Terminator 2: Judgment Day to do a screwball crime comedy with Estelle Getty. Is that likely in ANY universe? Here's a trailer to Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot to rejigger your memory that when Schwarzenegger was killing the T-1000, Stallone was doing THIS.
Of course, maybe Schwarzenegger's people purposely sent mixed signals about this "hot script" to get Stallone involved. It's totally evil to do this, of course, but it seems par for the course in Hollywood. Clearly Schwarzenegger believes in crushing his enemies, seeing them driven before him, and hearing the lamentations of their women. Maybe it will explain Reach Me.
The Expendables 3 is in theaters today.
