I never knew Scarface was originally a book set in Chicago in the 30s- it's in the public domain now, and we recently transcribed it as a free ebook on Wikisource: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Scarface
I was a visitor on-set the day of the great Scarface disaster, when Pacino nearly killed himself by tripping at the wrong time and grabbing the wrong thing with which to steady himself.
It was the final scene, where "Tony Montana" is killed. They were going to destroy the set by "gunfire" and take it up to the point when Tony falls out of the second story and ends up dead in the pool below. That really existed, in the house in Santa Barbara they were using for the exteriors. Tony would be chased through the house by the assassins, and in the end by blown away with a shotgun, as he fought them off with an AR-15 modified for full auto. Squibs were all over the set, and would be set off by a member of the SFX team offstage. It's important to note that Pacino's final mark had been made with a pair of 2x4s where "X marks the spot." This was going to be one long take and at the end the set would be destroyed.
So they start up, DePalma calls "action," and everything goes as you remember the scene watching in the theater.
Except, at the end, Pacino trips over the 2x4s and drops his gun. He grabs for it and ends up grabbing the red-hot barrel. He screams, drops it and starts to stagger back toward the window. Except there is no pool beyond it, only concrete floor. Nobody seems to know things have gone wrong other than Pacino and the actor who is to "blow him away."
At literally the last moment, before Pacino went out the window and ended up hittng the concrete floor 20 feet below, the "killer" actor grabbed his belt and pulled him back. Disaster was averted.
Pacino spent six weeks recovering from the burns. This gave the crew time to rebuild the set (god knows how much money this cost - the production accountant does too). Finally everyone is ready to go at it again. This time they use tape for "X marks the spot," and all goes well and we have all seen that final shootout and been amazed by it. (I forgot, during production, DP John Alonzo developed a way to wire the guns to the camera so they only fired when the aperture was open, so there is no rotoscoping in the entire movie).
Yeah, back in the days when makin' mo'om pitchas was fun.
First of all, I adore this, and thank you so much for sharing your recollections! One slight question: when Tony is killed, he swan dives off the interior balcony, but there is no window. Or are you referring to the slightly earlier scene with the French windows behind Tony’s office desk, where the first unlucky hitman pops out too early after Tony’s sister goes postal, and shoots the wrong Montana? Sorry to go all Comic Book Guy about this but I want to have this perfectly in my head. One of my favourite movies! :)
It really was. There were guys from the Golden Age still working. I met Wendell Mayes, who wrote three of my favorite movies when I was growing up (Spirit of St Louis, The Hunters, The Enemy Below). He introduced me to his great good friend Billy Wilder, who read the Vietnam script that first got me notice (before ending its career in 1990 being called "The best unproduced Vietnam script in Hollywood" in American Film) and decided I was smart enough to listen to his stories (actually I was the only person he knew who hadn't heard them 10,000 times). He still had his office over in the Golden Triangle, and I had lunch with him twice a month for two years. The stories were a post graduate seminar in film making. (Most important point: "If you don't give a shit about what you're doing, why should anyone else?") Wendell and I were friends over the last ten years of his life, a wonderful guy and a great writer to know. (Had you told me when I saw his movies over at my "fillum skool," the old Park Theater on South Gaylord Street in the Washington Park neighborhood of South Denver I attended every Saturday from age 6 to 14 when it closed, that the guy who wrote them would become a friend and peer, I would have thought you were crazy)
You can actually get a pretty good idea of those days if you watch "The Player." Studio executives in competition with each other to find ORIGINAL CONTENT! What a concept!
I never knew Scarface was originally a book set in Chicago in the 30s- it's in the public domain now, and we recently transcribed it as a free ebook on Wikisource: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Scarface
I was a visitor on-set the day of the great Scarface disaster, when Pacino nearly killed himself by tripping at the wrong time and grabbing the wrong thing with which to steady himself.
It was the final scene, where "Tony Montana" is killed. They were going to destroy the set by "gunfire" and take it up to the point when Tony falls out of the second story and ends up dead in the pool below. That really existed, in the house in Santa Barbara they were using for the exteriors. Tony would be chased through the house by the assassins, and in the end by blown away with a shotgun, as he fought them off with an AR-15 modified for full auto. Squibs were all over the set, and would be set off by a member of the SFX team offstage. It's important to note that Pacino's final mark had been made with a pair of 2x4s where "X marks the spot." This was going to be one long take and at the end the set would be destroyed.
So they start up, DePalma calls "action," and everything goes as you remember the scene watching in the theater.
Except, at the end, Pacino trips over the 2x4s and drops his gun. He grabs for it and ends up grabbing the red-hot barrel. He screams, drops it and starts to stagger back toward the window. Except there is no pool beyond it, only concrete floor. Nobody seems to know things have gone wrong other than Pacino and the actor who is to "blow him away."
At literally the last moment, before Pacino went out the window and ended up hittng the concrete floor 20 feet below, the "killer" actor grabbed his belt and pulled him back. Disaster was averted.
Pacino spent six weeks recovering from the burns. This gave the crew time to rebuild the set (god knows how much money this cost - the production accountant does too). Finally everyone is ready to go at it again. This time they use tape for "X marks the spot," and all goes well and we have all seen that final shootout and been amazed by it. (I forgot, during production, DP John Alonzo developed a way to wire the guns to the camera so they only fired when the aperture was open, so there is no rotoscoping in the entire movie).
Yeah, back in the days when makin' mo'om pitchas was fun.
First of all, I adore this, and thank you so much for sharing your recollections! One slight question: when Tony is killed, he swan dives off the interior balcony, but there is no window. Or are you referring to the slightly earlier scene with the French windows behind Tony’s office desk, where the first unlucky hitman pops out too early after Tony’s sister goes postal, and shoots the wrong Montana? Sorry to go all Comic Book Guy about this but I want to have this perfectly in my head. One of my favourite movies! :)
So, 40+ years ago. It must be the slightly earlier one, because he nearly stumbled back into the window and out.
Amazing, thank you! :D What a gift it must have been to be there! Hollywood in the eighties must have been something else.
It really was. There were guys from the Golden Age still working. I met Wendell Mayes, who wrote three of my favorite movies when I was growing up (Spirit of St Louis, The Hunters, The Enemy Below). He introduced me to his great good friend Billy Wilder, who read the Vietnam script that first got me notice (before ending its career in 1990 being called "The best unproduced Vietnam script in Hollywood" in American Film) and decided I was smart enough to listen to his stories (actually I was the only person he knew who hadn't heard them 10,000 times). He still had his office over in the Golden Triangle, and I had lunch with him twice a month for two years. The stories were a post graduate seminar in film making. (Most important point: "If you don't give a shit about what you're doing, why should anyone else?") Wendell and I were friends over the last ten years of his life, a wonderful guy and a great writer to know. (Had you told me when I saw his movies over at my "fillum skool," the old Park Theater on South Gaylord Street in the Washington Park neighborhood of South Denver I attended every Saturday from age 6 to 14 when it closed, that the guy who wrote them would become a friend and peer, I would have thought you were crazy)
You can actually get a pretty good idea of those days if you watch "The Player." Studio executives in competition with each other to find ORIGINAL CONTENT! What a concept!
That's crazy!
aka, "that's Entertainment!" That's Hollywood. :-)
Amazing story! Thanks for sharing
Thank you. I appreciated this analysis.