To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of sci-fi action sequel Predator 2, director Stephen Hopkins sat down to discuss the movie all these years later, offering some very interesting stories from the behind-the-scenes. Probably the most interesting is the tale of Steven Seagal’s desperation to star in the movie and go toe-to-toe with the Predator. While this sadly never happened, Hopkins did have a meeting with Seagal, whose outlandish ideas about his role in the movie ultimately killed this action dream-team from happening.
“[Steven Seagal] was on board, and I had to go have a meeting with him at his house, which was one of the craziest afternoons I’ve had, sort of to talk him out of doing it. It was a bizarre — he’s a very unusual, slightly twisted kind of guy, and in the end I couldn’t see myself doing it with him. It didn’t feel right. He wasn’t the kind of hero… I thought it would just turn into a cheesy — you know, it’s got plenty of cheese now, but it’s a kind of cool cheese, I think, as opposed to uncool cheese.”
While Stephen Hopkins had the image of an “everyman” type detective in mind, Seagal wanted to go in a very different direction…and play the same character he plays in every one of his movies.
“He was desperate to do it. I went up to his house, he crushed my hand and he took me into a room where all the walls were covered with guns. He told me he wanted to play a CIA psychiatrist who is also a martial arts expert and carried a gun. I listened to him for a long time, and he was clearly a little crazy at the time. I said, ‘Oh, this is different from the way we were going, so I guess we shouldn’t do it.’ Then he became really keen to do it, and he threw his arm around me on the way out and he said, ‘I want you to come to my ranch in Santa Barbara because I’ve got a grenade launching range there, so we can go and launch grenades together.’ I said, ‘Yeah, great, we’ll do that.’ But that didn’t happen. Sorry, I’m not a fan of his, so…”
Initially, the plan for Predator 2 was for action icon Arnold Schwarzenegger to return and team-up with an LAPD detective, with Patrick Swayze being suggested as a casting option. The role eventually went to Danny Glover, who is thrown into a battle on the streets of Los Angeles against the legendary alien hunter. While the movie is looked upon more favorably now than it was upon release, action fans will no doubt forever wonder what action delights Predator 2 would have served up had Seagal had his way.
It was recently revealed that the Predator franchise is set to continue at Disney, with 10 Cloverfield Lane director Dan Trachtenberg at the helm. Rumors have even begun to circulate concerning the movie’s plot which will reportedly take the legendary extra-terrestrial warrior to the past “focus around Native Americans before the territories were taken by the American settlers, featuring a First Nations cast.” This comes to us from Howard Gorman’s official YouTube channel.
