Wild Hollywood Casting (Arnold Schwarzenegger Was Not The Original Terminator)

By Stephen Schochet

Can you imagine Doris Day as Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate (1967)? That's who producer Joseph E. Levine wanted before Miss Day turned it down thinking the part in bad taste, and it went to Anne Bancroft. How about James Cagney as Robin Hood in 1938? A contract dispute caused Warner Bros. to drop him and use Errol Flynn instead. Did you know that Margaret Mitchell wanted Groucho Marx to play Rhett Butler in Gone With The Wind (1939)? But perhaps the wildest casting choice in the History of Hollywood involved The Terminator.

James Cameron had directed a movie called Piranha II: The Spawning (1981). "I'm sick of these B-Movies. I got to direct a better movie than this. I'll write my own script and won't sell it till I get to direct it. What kind of script should I write? I'm going to have a low budget, I want to film on the streets of LA-- I'll do a story about a cyborg from the future who attacks people in Los Angeles in the Present." After the script was finished Cameron received a phone call from Orion pictures," James, we love your script. It's a go! We'll let you direct it. We will let you cast whoever you want within reason-- But we think we found the perfect guy to play the robot -- OJ SIMPSON! Oh and Arnold Schwarzenegger can play the good guy Reese.

So James Cameron thought about it," OJ Simpson huh. Hmmm. No I can't see OJ Simpson as a killer."

Stephen Schochet tells Hollywood Stories on radio, audiobooks, tours and speaking engagements. To hear more tales go to http://www.hollywoodstories.com.