Actor Mark Wahlberg discussed an intense experience from filming the comedy Ted 2 involving a deleted scene. Despite never making the final cut, Wahlberg was forced to memorize a random list of 57 movie character names, and five years later, he still wakes up “saying that shit.”
The comedy Ted 2 was released in 2015 as a sequel to Seth MacFarlane’s original 2012 hit film, with Mark Wahlberg reprising his role as the titular teddy bear’s best friend. The plot involves Ted fighting to gain legal recognition as a person, rather than mere property. Wahlberg’s character John is Ted’s longtime buddy who helps him in his legal battles and silly misadventures.
Mark Wahlberg Can’t Forget Deleted Ted Scene That Made Him Recite 57 Names
While making a recent appearance on The Graham Norton Show, in the cut Ted 2 segment, Wahlberg’s character was supposed to rapidly recite the bizarre name list on demand for Ted. And even though the moment got scrapped, Mark Wahlberg demonstrated to Norton’s audience that he can still rattle off the endless roll call entirely from memory.
“I still wake up in the morning saying that shit,” Wahlberg recalled. “I was doing a scene where Ted says ‘Do that thing with the [movie] names again.” I thought we’ll throw back to it, or maybe [Seth MacFarlane] just made me study this for four months, and then I’ll never use it.”
The list Wahlberg committed to memory contains 57 seemingly random names of movie characters, including everything from King Kong, Rocky Balboa, and Forrest Gump to more obscure picks like Turner and Hooch.
Some of the names he recites in rapid succession include: “Beetlejuice, Bond, James Bond, Juan Sánchez Villa-Lobos Ramírez, Zorro, Pee Wee Herman…” and so forth down the lengthy inventory lodged in Wahlberg’s brain.
By all accounts, it’s a completely arbitrary sequence of fictional people that serves no clear narrative purpose even for a zany comedy like Ted. But that didn’t prevent MacFarlane, who wrote and directed both Ted films, from forcing his star to endlessly practice the tangent.
Why Does Mark Wahlberg Still Remember a Deleted Movie Scene?
When asked by Norton why he still recalls the unused scene dialog years later, Wahlberg half-joked: “I think about this shit all the time.” Clearly, the bizarre filmmaking experience left quite an impression.
Wahlberg speculated MacFarlane possibly made him memorize the random lines believing they might be useful later down the line for Ted’s foul-mouthed teddy bear humor. Or perhaps MacFarlane simply wanted to torture his lead actor for a laugh.
In any case, the intense preparation exemplifies Wahlberg’s commitment to roles. And it shows even strange, abandoned ideas can stubbornly stick in an actor’s mind if they put in exhaustive work.
The referenced deleted scene would have likely appeared early on in the film to quickly showcase the crude dynamic between John and Ted. But ultimately, the director Seth MacFarlane ended up cutting the sequence featuring Wahlberg rapidly listing the movie names.
