Apex Mountain on The Rewatchables
69:03 – 79:10… Just getting banned from the set and it's your book. why don't you come on back and play a major role in this film? I had this later, but I do think this was Apex Mountain for super drunk writers just getting in fist fights. Just like that Norman Mailer era. This is definitely the era. Also, like, also the director was like, let's fight. Hunter Thompson. That sounds good. Yeah. Everybody's just like, but Hemingway, I think takes that bill. Uh, it's true. Oh, you go for, all right, maybe not. Hemingway in the Dempsey book, uh, a flame of pure fire, which is arguably my favorite book I've ever read. Roger Kahn. …
The whole segment, as transcribed
Borman suffered a broken nose and some broken teeth, but then they made up and then he cast Dickey as the sheriff. They banned him from the set though. And then they brought him back to play a major part. Great. They used to just roll with the punches back in Hollywood. I love that. Yeah. Just getting banned from the set and it's your book. why don't you come on back and play a major role in this film? I had this later, but I do think this was Apex Mountain for super drunk writers just getting in fist fights. Just like that Norman Mailer era. This is definitely the era. Also, like, also the director was like, let's fight. Hunter Thompson. That sounds good. Yeah. Everybody's just like, but Hemingway, I think takes that bill. Uh, it's true. Oh, you go for, all right, maybe not. Hemingway in the Dempsey book, uh, a flame of pure fire, which is arguably my favorite book I've ever read. Roger Kahn. Okay. Uh, Dempsey admits that like hanging out with Hemingway, he was like, that guy was dangerous because he actually thought he could maybe take me and I would have killed him. He's like, but Hemingway would get shit faced and be like, you know, I'm not sure or whatever. And he's like, he scared me because I was afraid I might actually have to like really fuck him up. Yeah. That was like me and my son when my son was like 10, when he was side eyeing me. I can take you dad. But now he can take me. Yeah. Now, but you just gouge his eyes out, right? I don't even know if I could do that anymore. He came back the other day and was talking about how he did something for 285 pounds for eight reps. And I was like, I got to find out from her. So he said, no, no, don't tell Rosillo anything yet. Give me like one more month. That's the thing about him is he thinks he's going to catch me in like six months. So he doesn't want to tell me any of his stats. The only thing I'm worried about with Ben is the, is the heavy back stuff. Like I keep getting these deadlift numbers and I'm like, it's impressive. Yeah. I personally think when you're really young, I don't, I, people will tell me I'm wrong. I just think, you know, there's no, don't be in a rush to have. I think I might, you might need to do a little FaceTime. He's not going to listen. Ben's going to turn into TMAC. He's going to be rolling it out on the floor pretty soon. Don't want that. Um, so we talked about the cost cutting stuff where, um, this was the story about when Reynolds got hurt, where it's, he said, how did it look? And he woke up at his bedside with the director next time. He's like, how did it look? And, and, uh, Borman said, it looked like a dummy falling over a waterfall, which was the joke because they kept throwing the dummy over the waterfall, but he did get hurt. And then, uh, Beatty said, after he almost drowned, I thought I was going to drown him. The first thought was, how will John finish the film without me? And my second thought was, I bet the bastard will find a way. Um, no insurance for any of the actors. So there was some, this is great. There was, uh, some confusion about who came up with squeal like a pig. Who, who, who, uh, who's the author of that phrase? Was it Jimmy Carter? Ned Beatty said, he thought of it while they're improvising. Um, he's like, can you guys give me credit for something? He's like, Jesus Christ, you all right there. I came up with this. I was not ready for this. Um, Borman said one of the crew guys came up with it. And then Borman said, um, that he decided it. So he's, it's two different versions of Borman coming up with who did it. And nobody under, nobody really, there's no resolution, but we do know that Reynolds said, um, it was so uncomfortable watching film the scene that went on for so long that Reynolds said, I asked John Borman, the director, why did you let it go that long? And Borman said, I wanted to take it as far as I could with the audience. And I figured you'd run in when it got too far. So Burt Reynolds basically stopped it from continuing. There was plenty of stuff on researching this where Borman did not seem like the greatest hang. No, no. Like it was, he seemed like a deranged maniac. But like was treating the locals like shit too. Like really, you know, just kind of to the theme of the movie. Like I'm better than these people with his background. So I don't know that he was making a ton of friends. They like set up shop in this area in Georgia. They like rented out a country club. They were all like, they were living it up that summer. Reynolds is driving to Atlanta coming back at like four in the morning with cheerleaders. And meanwhile, Borman's like, yeah, yeah, like it's going to be a really respectful depiction of the area. And then it was like, let's get Billy in here. Dueling banjos, they didn't get permission and ended up in a whole copyright infringement case, which is, you can go read about if you want to. Chris, I'm just going to read this to you and you tell me what you think. Borman was given a gold record for the Dueling banjos hit single that was later stolen from his house by the Dublin gangster Martin Cahill. Love it. That's an actual, and then it said, that sentence alone is a TV, that's season one. Well, Borman recreated this scene in The General, 1998, his biographical film about Cahill. Yeah. There you go. Jimmy Carter, this movie caused him to establish a whole state film commission because he was the governor back then. Him and Burt Reynolds were like, let's shoot this in Georgia. Him and Burt Reynolds and by the next decade, they were like one of the top five places to film a movie and made a ton of money from it. It's still that way, isn't it? Yeah. With the tax breaks. It was all good. Apex Mountain. I got a couple more little half-ass. Oh, go. First of all, half-ass literary research. Yeah. In the book, Ed is a graphic designer. Oh. Louis is a landlord and Drew is a soft drink executive. What about Bobby? Bobby is a, Bobby's an insurance executive. Right. And in the book, after this all happens, Bobby moves to Hawaii. Oh. Interesting. He's like, you know what? Smart. I don't think I'm going to hang out. Smart. Selling him policies. Be like, hey, aren't you the fella? So. What happened to Bobby? He's gone. Also in the book, sort of the, the zag to the happy ending Hawaii is apparently in the book, there's a, Voight's character wants to kill Bobby, but he's talking to himself. He's having like homicidal fantasies about it. Yeah. He's so disgusted with him that he wants to kill him towards the end of them trying to get out of there. Yeah. But, um, maybe that one moment is the conflict as they're at the hospital. But, right. When they're shoving each other. Yeah. So it felt like when I, when I read about it and gone back and was like, oh, that's ignored. But I thought that was kind of important that there was one moment where they were upset with each other post being safe. But. And then Atlanta Magazine did an oral history about the making of the movie. Uh, the first time they were blocking the, um, you get a pretty mouth scene. I guess the mountain man tried, uh, I'm going to lay a big long dick right in your mouth on for size and everybody cracked up. It just didn't fit. You know, like it just works. Good job anyway. Another one. Another point, James Dickey took, uh, John Borman aside and, uh, said, never repeat this. I'm going to tell you something. I've never told anyone this. Everything in the book happened to me. And then John Borman was like, and then I saw him in a canoe and he capsized immediately and knew he was full of shit. Oh man, those seventies writers. Should we, should we introduce a new category that says, would this movie be better if somebody had said, I'm going to lay a big long dick? But, but to sit there on set and go, by the way, all this is real. Like there, there could be a category for, would John Borman say this? Oh no, excuse me, Dickey. Yeah. Yeah. James Dickey. Yeah. James Dickey sounds like he should have been a documentary. Apex Mountain. I think for the four actors, no Reynolds. No. But none of them. No, I mean, Beatty's, uh, Network soon. Network. He had an Academy Award nomination for Network. Deep Georgia. I don't know. Canoeing. Hillbillies. Canoeing's up there. I mean, it's this river wild. Banjos. Banjos, definitely. This or Steve Martin. Or Oh Brother, Where Art Thou. You know? Horrifically disturbing male rape scenes. Yes. Yeah. Um. Exposed femurs. Exposed femurs. Sleeveless scuba vests. Definitely. Dual citizen hillbillies. What would your reaction have been if I had just walked in with a sleeveless scuba vest? Like, hey guys. I was trying to find one for this. I'm not kidding. But then I was going to have to cut up a wetsuit and I was like, I don't think this is worth it. Best racehorse name. I could give you canoe trip. I could give you deliverance, which really sounds like a Kentucky Derby winner. And here comes deliverance. Deliverance is great. Yeah, that's a good one. Squeal like a pig maybe doesn't work as well. Pick and nits. Why do they spend so much time arguing what to do with the dead body? Like, if we ever have to deal with a dead body, let's just get fucking rid of the dead body and bury it and get the hell out of there. Well, I mean, they're like, so we just go, we try to find the cops, we go report it to the highway patrol. Like, they tried to walk the line and then they're just like, this is what's going to happen. The jury thing was actually really important. Yeah. They're in the middle of nowhere. Like, they're going to get killed. You got to get the fuck out of there. I don't know. I wouldn't have spent that much time. I wouldn't have thrown away the weapons. I would have dragged the body towards the water, grabbed all the weapons and then be like, we can talk out here in the open and figure this out. Although, you might have been more exposed. Why did Voight climb the cliff? Like, if you really had to say, why is this happening? I think because they were, I think the idea is that they're pretty sure someone from above has shot Drew. So, Voight's going to go up and look to see because this guy's just going to pick them off one by one otherwise. Pretty risky plan. I actually thought that made sense because they keep, I think they sell that well. Yeah. I'm not telling you it's safe. This guy, 10 minutes ago, was shaking when he was like trying to shoot a deer. Now he's going to climb a cliff. Like he's faced with these increases. But that's why Lewis has a broken leg. I mean, if Lewis doesn't have the broken leg, then none of this happens because Lewis would have gone up there. Yeah. So like, this is the forcing, you know. But why not just keep going down the river? You're faster than any person on foot. Just keep going. Well, the canoes are busted up by then, right? One of them isn't. One of them isn't. Just keep going. You think if you're faster in a canoe than I got to shoot
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