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John Carpenter Almost 'Quit The Business' After Awful Experience Directing Chevy Chase In 1992
Anyone who loves horror movies knows John Carpenter is one of the fathers of the genre.
He directed many iconic horror movies such as Halloween, The Thing, The Fog, Christine and They Live just to name a few. And Carpenter also had some classic films outside the horror genre, like Escape From New York, Big Trouble In Little China, Assault On Precinct 13 and Starman.
But imagine a world where the beloved horror director quit part way through his career. Imagine missing out on amazing movies such as Escape from L.A, Ghosts of Mars, Vampires, and Vampires Los Muertos among others.
Even further, imagine if the movie that almost took out the king of horror was a science fiction romantic comedy.
That horrifying thought almost became a reality.
After working with Chevy Chase in the 1992 movie Memoirs of an Invisible Man, Carpenter had such a bad experience he almost quit the directing business.
\u201cChevy Chase and John Carpenter on the set of MEMOIRS OF AN INVISIBLE MAN.\u201d— Peter Avellino (@Peter Avellino) 1516144987
\u201cLove this @BeautifulBill interview w/ a salty John Carpenter. Here he is on "Memoirs of an Invisible Man" and (I think) Chevy Chase: "He shall not be named who needs to be killed. No, no, no, that\u2019s terrible. He needs to be set on fire." https://t.co/jU83ymJokH\u201d— Brent Lang (@Brent Lang) 1673471739
Carpenter told Variety:
“But Chevy Chase and Sam Neill—who I love and had a longtime friendship with—and Warner Bros. … I worked for them, and it was pleasant."
"No, it wasn’t pleasant at all. I’m lying to you. It was a horror show."
"I really wanted to quit the business after that movie."
"God, I don’t want to talk about why, but let’s just say there were personalities on that film … he shall not be named who needs to be killed. No, no, no, that’s terrible. He needs to be set on fire. No, no, no."
"Anyway, it’s all fine. I survived it.”
\u201cWorking with Chevy Chase clearly scarred John Carpenter and it's the one movie he hardly ever talks about. But the glimpse he gives to Variety here is great. https://t.co/h6qS96MEpv\u201d— Paul McLeod (@Paul McLeod) 1673631358
While Carpenter didn't exactly name who he had such an awful experience with, he didnt exactly hide it either.
In his quote he stated he loved Sam Neill and had a longtime friendship with him. He continued to make movies with Neill and he never made another movie with Chase.
As expected social media had a lot to say about this.
\u201cAs if John Carpenter couldn\u2019t be any cooler, he wanted to quit making movies after working with Chevy Chase.\u201d— Brad Milne\ud83d\udd38 (@Brad Milne\ud83d\udd38) 1673479238
Most people were not at all surprised by this news.
\u201c@Darbmilne Chase was supposed to make that movie with Ivan Reitman and William Goldman, and they both quit right before production because they couldn't work with Chevy.\u201d— Brad Milne\ud83d\udd38 (@Brad Milne\ud83d\udd38) 1673479238
\u201c@whatalanwatches It's interesting how many filmmakers have one movie they refuse to discuss at all and the common denominator seems to be Chevy Chase.\u201d— DrewMcWeeny (@DrewMcWeeny) 1659486769
\u201c@MarxGBaker Yeah that sounds like Chase alright.\u201d— Brad Milne\ud83d\udd38 (@Brad Milne\ud83d\udd38) 1673479238
\u201c@BrentALang @BeautifulBill Yikes. I heard that Chevy Chase was a jerk. But wow....\u201d— Brent Lang (@Brent Lang) 1673471739
\u201cI\u2019ll drink from the \u201cJohn Carpenter\u2019s disdain for Chevy Chase\u201d souvenir cup please.\u201d— BRYAN M. FERGUSON (@BRYAN M. FERGUSON) 1673618580
\u201c@DrewMcWeeny While they were shooting season one, I flew on a private jet to Vegas with Dan Harmon and the entire cast of Community sans Chevy.\n\nThe only thing they all talked about the entire flight was Chevy.\u201d— DrewMcWeeny (@DrewMcWeeny) 1659486769
At the end of the day, if Carpenter had quit, it would have been a huge loss to film fans everywhere.
Moviegoers are beyond happy Carpenter survived it.