Arnold Schwarzenegger is one of the most celebrated icons of the film industry, who has established himself in Hollywood, over the years. Throughout his career, the actor has delivered many incredible films, and among them is his unforgettable film Terminator. Schwarzenegger played the role of the titular character in the film which is considered to be one of the best roles of his career.
However, the journey to secure this role is a twisted tale in itself. Initially, Schwarzenegger wasn’t interested in playing the character in Terminator, but later when he got to know about his role, he went crazy to portray the character. But, the director of the film, James Cameron had double thoughts on his casting.
Arnold Schwarzenegger was not interested in playing the role of the Terminator
Arnold Schwarzenegger‘s appearance in the 1984 blockbuster film Terminator is nothing less than iconic. While his role as a killer robot was well acclaimed by the audience, it would be surprising for his fans to know that this wasn’t the role Schwarzenegger was aiming for.
During an interview with Men’s Health, the actor revealed that Terminator isn’t the role he was aiming to perform as he wanted to play the role of human resistance fighter Kyle Reese (played by Michael Biehn). But when he read the script for the movie, his perception changed. He said, “I got fixated on the Terminator.”
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Schwarzenegger recalled his conversation with the director in which he provided his analysis of the Terminator character, which blew the director’s mind. He explained,
“He’s a machine. So everything has to be matter-of-fact. I told Jim that. I said there should be no joy, no gratification, no kind of victory lap of any sort. Just the mission, complete. I go through these points. Jim, afterward, says to me, ‘Fu*k, you analyze it better than the way I have written it. Why don’t you play the Terminator?'”
The actor was initially reluctant to portray Terminator because he had just 27 lines in the entire film, but eventually, when he learned about the character, he was drawn towards playing it. Indeed, his decision turned out to be in his favor, as his role was well-acclaimed by the audience.
James Cameron was initially skeptical about Arnold Schwarzenegger’s casting in Terminator
While Arnold Schwarzenegger was certain about his casting in Terminator, James Cameron had some doubts about his casting. During an interview with GQ, the director explained his side of the story. Cameron claimed that, when Schwarzenegger came to pitch himself for the role of Kyle Reese, he talked more from the perspective of the antagonist, Terminator. Cameron recalled,
“Arnold came in to talk to me about the character of Reese, supposedly. He had a great deal of enthusiasm for the script in general. And when he was waxing eloquent about the action scenes, but he kept talking about it kind of from the Terminator’s perspective and how cool that was and so on. We didn’t talk about Reese as much as I would’ve expected somebody pitching themselves for that character would have. He just had this kind of generic enthusiasm for the film.”
Cameron further explained that he was unsure about casting Schwarzenegger as Reese because his appearance didn’t align with what he imagined the character of Reese as. The filmmaker said,
“I couldn’t get over kind of how unique his face was, how it just almost just projected this kind of raw power. And my conception of the character had been that he was more of an infiltrator.”
However, he re-thought about Schwarzenegger’s casting and envisioned him in the role of Terminator. He said,
“My perspective shifted and I would say it pivoted kind of on a dime. All right, if I cast this guy, how are they not all gonna see him coming? How does he not stand out in a crowd? How do they not all look at him? And I thought, ‘You know what, don’t worry about it, because he would make an amazing Terminator.’ Because I just saw him as like this kind of bulldozer, this kind of armored tank, you know. And he could just move through a crowd. If anybody was in his way, he’d just push them out of the way and you’d accept it.”
Eventually, Cameron offered the role of Terminator to Schwarzenegger, and when he played it, he made a significant impact on the audience with his performance.
Source: GQ
