Lying isn’t something that people are encouraged to do a lot of, especially in the world of entertainment. The subject is a great source of humor, as anyone from agents to writers, and even actors, are shown as being comically dishonest to varying degrees. However, sometimes desperate times call for desperate measures, as Jane Seymour pointed out when discussing her experience in the film The War with Grandpa. As it turns out, she and her veteran co-stars had to lie in order to take part in one of the film’s most exciting sequences: a dodgeball war, complete with trampolines.
On behalf of The War with Grandpa's home video release, CinemaBlend was given an opportunity to discuss the film with Jane Seymour herself. As we’d previously spoken with her during the promotion of the theatrical release, wild stories from the set of director Tim Hill’s family comedy already started to make their way to us. But the story about how the dodgeball scene prompted a massive wave of white lies is arguably even crazier than the fact that Ms. Seymour was mistaken for an actual employee in Fry’s Electronics! And as she shared to me during our conversation, Cheech Marin’s lies in particular could have been quite painful:
I never thought that at my age I’d be jumping up and down, bouncing and falling and jumping off walls with people that looked like they were going to the hospital before me, and which one of us would be the first to be carried out. We were all lying. We weren’t lying about our age, you can’t do that anymore, but we were all lying about our fitness levels, that was for sure … Cheech actually knew he was going to have a knee or a hip replacement straight afterwards. So, I don’t know what he was doing bouncing up and down. I mean, that was crazy; he could have completely blown out his limbs.
Thankfully, speaking with Jane Seymour didn’t contain a story about how Cheech Marin blew out his knee and had to be sidelined throughout the rest of The War with Grandpa’s shooting. However, the potential for danger is enough to still feel a little worried when watching the film for the first time after learning that knowledge. By that point in the movie, the scene is set for a battle of wits and physical prowess, as the titular war between Robert De Niro and Oakes Feigley’s characters creates an opportunity for a huge showdown. Trampolines and dodgeball mix into a set piece that, as you can see above, could have become an injury waiting to happen. However, when hearing Jane Seymour describe just how much fun shooting this sequence was, it’s not hard to see why the more veteran cast members would lie in order to take part in a rousing game for all the marbles.
Watching the dodgeball scene in The War with Grandpa is one of the most fun sequences that the film contains, and it ties together the various disciplines of humor that are present in director Tim Hill’s adaptation of author Robert Kimmel Smith’s legacy children’s novel. Dancing around sly nods to more grown up humor, while keeping everything PG rated and family friendly, the film really lets its cast play around in this gag-filled action scene. As you’ll see in the clip below, the prospect of Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, Cheech Marin and Jane Seymour together is as fun as you’d expect.
For all of the accidents we’ve heard about when it comes to making action intensive movies, no one probably saw The War with Grandpa making it onto a list of movies that could have seen a massive injury putting someone in the hospital. It’s something to think about, especially if preliminary plans for a sequel happen to come to pass; as the ante will definitely need to be upped for the movie already being teased as The World War with Grandpa. Though after hearing this story, it will be assumed that lying to take part in whatever antics top a dodgeball game on trampolines will be a lot harder to execute.
The War with Grandpa is currently available on Digital HD, with the Blu-ray/DVD home video release slated to drop tomorrow. If you’re looking for a holiday gift that the entire family can rally around, consider this title for your last-minute shopping needs. And keep it tuned here to CinemaBlend, as we’ll be running more from our interview with Jane Seymour throughout this week.
