Brendan Fraser reveals a surprising NSFW detail about the shower scene with Matt Damon from School Ties. Released in 1992, School Ties was directed by Robert Mandel with a script co-written by Law & Order‘s Dick Wolf that follows a Jewish high school football star who receives a scholarship to play at a prestigious prep school that is predominantly Evangelical. Early on, the film features a memorable scene when Fraser’s lead character fights one of his teammates, played by Matt Damon, in the school showers after outing him as Jewish.
Fraser has been on the awards circuit promoting his powerful comeback performance in The Whale and during a recent appearance on The Howard Stern Show, he pulled back the curtain on the School Ties shower scene.
The actor revealed that both he and Damon were completely naked while filming the scuffle in the showers, and recalled what the “scary” experience was like. See what Fraser shared in the video above and comments below:
I appreciated that this isn’t really for wow or a scintillating factor of going, “Hey, look at that. Naked people.” The point of it was that when Damon’s character says what he says about David, he just reveals who he is. His anti-Semitism and his prejudice is stripped down naked and it’s ugly. And the door is locked and they fight over it like shaved apes that need to be pulled apart because they’ve run out of things to say to one another, and it just turns into an ugly knuckle-dusting fit. When you’re an actor, and you’re starting off, you’re ambitious and game for pretty much anything. They say jump, you say how high?Chris O’Donnell — he kicked out the set photographer who was hiding in one of the bathroom stalls. “Yeah, Peter, you can go, thank you. You really don’t need to be there, do you?”
Why School Ties Was Important For Brendan Fraser’s Career
Other than the infamous shower scene, School Ties is not a movie that has been remembered well by audiences. The film was considered a commercial failure upon its release in 1992 and received mixed reviews for its predictable plot and occasionally heavy-handed messaging. However, it has been credited with helping launch the film careers for three of its stars – Fraser, Damon, and Ben Affleck.
As his first major film project, School Ties is especially credited with launching Fraser’s film career. Not long after, he was one of Hollywood’s premier leading men whom audiences fell in love with as the star of George of the Jungle and The Mummy trilogy. Due to some lackluster roles and various personal reasons, Fraser disappeared from Hollywood all together for much of the 2010s.
Fraser is now leading a highly-publicized and powerful comeback thanks to his heartrending performance in The Whale. After picking up some precursor awards this season, Fraser is arguably the favorite to win the Best Actor Oscar. However ironically, Fraser’s star power and in turn, his recent emotional comeback, will always be traced back to School Ties – and that uncomfortable shower scene with another rising star.
Source: The Howard Stern Show