Brendan Fraser’s big comeback in The Whale is revealing some details about a few of his other past works — including the time he went fully nude for a scene with Matt Damon.
Go on, we’re listening...
The actor was making an appearance on The Howard Stern Show in support of his latest film. The conversation turned to the 1992 film School Ties, in which he and Matt Damon get into a physical altercation in a locker room shower. Fraser confirmed that the actors were completely nude while filming the scene.
“I appreciated that this isn’t really for wow or a scintillating factor of going, ‘Hey, look at that. Naked people,’” recalled Fraser.
The fight occurred following Damon’s character Dillion’s revelation to the rest of the team that David (Fraser) was Jewish. “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,” Fraser explained.
Courtesy of Paramount Pictures
Fraser admits that getting nude, in his first feature film no less, was a scary experience. “When you’re an actor, and you’re starting off, you’re ambitious and game for pretty much anything,” he explained. “They say jump, you say how high?”
The actor shared that his co-stars helped alleviate the fear. “Chris O’Donnell — he kicked out the set photographer who was hiding in one of the bathroom stalls,” he joked. “‘Yeah, Peter, you can go, thank you. You really don’t need to be there, do you?’”
Fraser also shared how he related to his character David, specifically about feeling like an outsider. “In this case, David wanted to be a part of this school. He wanted the camaraderie, he wanted the glory that sport brought him. But it came at a cost, and the barrier was that he was Jewish, and their anti-Semitism kept him out,” Fraser explained. “So for all that need of wanting to belong, I identified with that because I felt like I want to be a part of this Hollywood also. I don’t know if I’m in the club or not… yet, if at all.”
Considering how beloved Fraser is to the fans, and how they’ve applauded his comeback (albeit in a controversial film, which critics fairly call stigmatizing against fat people), it’s fair to say he’s in.
Now to go fire up that School Ties DVD for reasons. Watch the interview below.
