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Rad is the story of a small-town boy,
Crew Jones, who is getting ready to take

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his SATs, and there is a big BMX event
coming to town called Hell Track.

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Through a series of unlikely events,
Crew Jones qualifies for Hell Track and

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eventually races and wins Hell Track.

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How was that guy?

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If you have a sport and you have a movie
about your sport, that's it.

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For BMX, it's Rad.

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Rad the movie, you couldn't have named
it anything else except Rad.

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I understand the development of Rad came
through the writer Sam Bernard, who just

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happened to see some BMX riders on the
street one day. Sam came to me with the

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idea to make a Rocky-esque type story
about... this new, fast-growing

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sport called BMX. And I thought it was a
good idea, and I went to Hal Needham,

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who directed Smoking the Bandit, and
written it with him.

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Robert Levy and I had worked together on
Smoking the Bandit, and he and Sam

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were good friends. I didn't know Sam,
and told me what they thought it would

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do and their plans and everything and
what I cared to get involved.

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Never dreaming it was going to be what
it is.

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Never even give it a thought.

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The Karate Kid, I think, was a little
bit before us, and I think that that was

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very much on our minds. It was
successful.

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It was about something that was just
becoming into the media consciousness.

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So I think we had a lot of help, but I
think it was natural.

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My reputation as a director was Smokey
and the Bandit, Hooper, Cannonball Run,

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and all those kind of things. This was a
little different, and I wanted to give

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it a whirl. And when we met the
wonderful man, Jack Schwartzman, And his

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wife, Talia Shire, and they had a
company that was funding movies.

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And they had a number of young children.
And it was kind of a perfect marriage

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because they wanted to make something
for the kids. This was a kid's movie.

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Listen, we called it Rocky on Bikes as
it fits.

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I said, oh, I think this is something I
could be different with.

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The script, as I read it the first time,
was pretty much how we shot it. I think

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the title Rad was a working title.

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A lot of people weren't.

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really understood what that word meant.

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I mean, it wasn't that much in the
lexicon quite yet.

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And Hal was the go-to guy for stunt
movies at the time.

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Hal, you know, was a legend in every
way. And, yeah, he was such an icon. I

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mean, he shot fast.

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He energized the crew.

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He knew exactly what he wanted. So if he
had it, he moved on.

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He'd done every car stunt there ever
was.

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you know, basically.

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So that was like trying to bring his
talent to a different kind of... I was

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real familiar with motorcycle because I
raced the Desert, I raced TT and so on

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and so forth.

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And there's a great similarity, you
know. And when they gave me the script

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for Rad, I compared the one to the other
and

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I...

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Got a hold of some of the pros and found
out what they could do and what they

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couldn't and everything.

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And I just thought it would be a step
forward for BMX. And so that's the

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reason I took the job.

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And he didn't believe any of this at
first.

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We really had to talk him into it. We
really had to talk him into it. He just

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was like, eh, bicycle.

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We were, at the time, we were casting
for Rad, and I was watching Hill Street

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Blues, or was it? I don't know. Anyway,
I think it was a Cop and Robber thing.

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But I watched him, and I thought, that
kid's got to look.

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He's got the age and everything.

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So I went into Jack Schwartzman, the
producer.

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I went in and told him, I said, I've got
a kid I want you to look at because I

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think he's really got what we're looking
for.

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And he said, do you like him? I said,
yeah. He said, we'll cast him. And

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that's the way he got the part.

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Well, I was something of an anomaly
because I wasn't a Hollywood actor, had

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no acting experience, and I wasn't a BMX
rider.

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But shortly after the 1984 Olympics, I
had a fairly high amount of visibility.

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I had an agent in New York, and I was
doing appearances and promotional

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things, and I got a call one day, and
they said, there's a director in L.A.

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named Hal Needham. You might remember
him from Smokey and the Bandit and

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Cannonball Run. He wants to talk to you
about a movie they're doing about BMX.

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And this is completely out of the blue.
So I'm like, wow, I mean, I don't ride,

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but any athlete is excited about an
opportunity that comes along, especially

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from Hollywood, I mean, of course.

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And so he said, I'm going to stop in
Oklahoma. I'd like to have a cup of

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coffee with you. And they sent me some
lines and stuff. So I was practicing the

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lines. I've never auditioned for
anything and kind of nervous to meet

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him. And he shows up at the airport and
I went up to pick him up. And I'm a car

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guy as well. And I pick him up in a
turbo Porsche.

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And we drove around town and we talked
about cars for about an hour.

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And I said, do you want to sit down
somewhere and run some of these lines?

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And he goes, oh, no, you're in my movie.
Just take me back to the airport. We're

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good. And so that was my audition. We
just talked cars for an hour.

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How is your typical Southern gentleman?
And you would not know that just by

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meeting the guy right off the bat. All I
knew was, here's a guy who directed

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Smokey the Bandit.

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But being a guy from the South and being
used to being around good old boys, we

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got along great. I can tell you that the
night before filming, he asked that I

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show up on time.

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And he just related to me a story of...

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directing Cannonball Run 2 with Frank
Sinatra and Shirley MacLaine right after

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she won the Oscar and Dino and Sammy
Davis Jr.

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He said he had 25 star trailers out in
the desert and nobody would show up onto

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the set until everybody else was on the
set.

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He said, so just please be on time. I'm
like, it's not going to be a problem. It

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only took about two seconds to figure
out that Hal Needham was the boss.

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And I suffered two chew-outs.

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But on the same hand, I suffered a
couple of attaboys from Hal Needham,

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too. But he was the big cheese and a
great guy.

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Lori Loughlin was my co-star in the
movie. And the reason you hire a Lori

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Loughlin, or Lori Loughlin in
particular, is so that you can fall in

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love with her from frame one. There
doesn't have to be explanation. There

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doesn't have to be a whole backstory.

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She's the kind of person you fall in
love with just by seeing her. She was so

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nice and so sweet to all of us that, you
know, no wonder we all had a crush on

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her. Did I have a crush on her? Well,
yes, of course.

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Jack Weston, watching Jack Weston.

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Twilight Zone episodes and a million
movies.

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Ray Walston, who played Mr. Timmer in
it, he was in the original production of

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South Pacific.

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HB obviously was fun.

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HB was our first choice, but, you know,
I mean, he was so perfect for it, and he

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was great.

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You know, he would have been a wrestler.

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But we wanted a wrestler. We wanted that
kind of guy. We wanted bigger than life.

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We wanted, you know, very Americana, you
know, apple pie.

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Ray Walston and those guys, Alfie Wise,
I mean... That was so cool because these

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are all Hal's buddies. You know, he just
bought all of his pals up there to be in

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that film. And so for us, that was a
thrill because we're just a bunch of

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kids in our first movie, and all of a
sudden we're in scenes with these, you

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know, Hollywood icons. That was so
sweet.

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I was surprisingly cast in I think what
they call a principal role, a co-star in

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the movie as Luke, who turns out to be
best friend to crew, boyfriend

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to Becky, and just all around. a great
BMX rider.

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Well, not me personally, but the great
fellows who did the stunt work. I got

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along with Laura Jacoby was her name
really well.

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You want to be careful about working
with kids or animals because, man, they

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can steal a scene just like that. And
she was one of those scene stealers.

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Talia Shire was my boss on this shoot.

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Not only was she my boss, but I had seen
her in all the Rocky films. I had seen

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her in the Godfather films. A very huge
thing for a young actor to be around

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somebody who is such a luminary in the
business.

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And the best thing is she's like
everybody's mom on the set.

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She's the most wonderful, warm-hearted
person.

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Rad is such a stunt-heavy movie that...

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I pretty much had to fit into the mold
that they had for me, not vice versa.

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Eddie Fiola, who did most of my stunt
writings, very dark skin, dark hair, so

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I ended up dyeing my hair black to match
the stunt guy. That never happens.

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You know, I'm just what happened to be
crew's stunt double most of the time, or

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you could say that crew was my acting
double.

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It just shows you how much the stunts
meant to this movie and how important it

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was for me.

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to look like a stunt writer. What's good
is that Martin and I, we do a lot of

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different tricks. So I'm like, he
doesn't do a lot of tricks I do. I don't

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do a lot of tricks he does. So in the
movie, it really made a lot of sense to

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keep us both in it to where he could do
the things that I couldn't do, and it

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worked out really well.

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Even after knowing what they can do, I
was in awe.

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How's innovation as a director, however,
is that he sets up maybe a half a dozen

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cameras in these action scenes and lets
the writers do what they do, crash as

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they do, and weave that into the
storyline. So that, I would say, is how

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things change to take events that
actually took place on the set and weave

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that into the storyline.

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I used to consider myself a pretty good
gymnast and athlete, you know, but they

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were doing things I'm going, how the
hell they do that?

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I mean, a guy was doing a handstand,
feet up in the air, riding on the front

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wheel and everything, and I'm going,
wow, what balance, what strength it

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takes to do that. They were wonderful.

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Hal has a reputation for being rough on
stuntmen because he was the highest paid

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stuntman of his time.

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No special effects back then, you know,
everything was real.

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If we crashed and got hurt, you have to
wait a couple hours until we got better.

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Luckily, I was an actor under Hal, not a
stuntman, because these guys...

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earned their pay.

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The interesting thing about this shoot
was it was probably the only stunt-heavy

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film that Hal was ever on, I don't think
he was ever on any other kind of movie,

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that he didn't know the stunts better
than Stuntman. He was not a BMX rider,

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so he had to trust these kids.

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Being a stuntman, I didn't want to take
advantage of those kids, so when they

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did something accidental or on purpose,
we compensated them for it.

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But I got quite a few freebies, if you
want to call them that, things that

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weren't planned.

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There's free stunts. The free stunts are
when guys just eat it great on camera,

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unplanned, but that's a free stunt.

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And there were a couple memorable free
stunts. Eddie Fiola.

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As Crew Jones wiping out. All I remember
is getting up from off the ground and

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saying, where am I at? What am I doing?

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We regrouped and Hal just said, okay,
now we're going to take it from here. As

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if you already fell, you'll get out of
the bushes and then take off again. So

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that's what we did. That was not
planned. And he suffered a concussion.

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If you watch that thing again, now that
you know that that wasn't planned, he

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got racked.

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And he was a trooper. And that rung his
bell really good. So we're talking about

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very dangerous stunts.

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And that's what Hal needed. And that was
his stock in trade.

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And I thought he just did a brilliant
job at capturing that.

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You know, people out there riding the
bikes are real. But I remember that

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headshot that Eddie took was quite
scary. But that dude, to his credit, you

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know, stayed in his character and got up
and took off and I think asked for more

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money.

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I would have paid him.

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And we knew that the backflip was going
to be the biggest stunt.

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And I found out it was also the highest
paid stunt.

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So I had this brainstorm.

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Oh, wow.

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So I saddled myself up next to Hal
Needham, and I said, Hal, you don't have

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a really spectacular crash yet. Do you
think maybe when we go around this turn

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here, this berm, what if I fly out over
the top and wreck?

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And he said, yeah, that'd be great.

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I said, okay.

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You know, I'll do that for $300.

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And he just kind of looked at me, and he
goes, okay, Hollywood, go ahead.

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So we shot the movie, and you know what
I'm doing, and I fly over the berm, and

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I pull my bike over, and it looks
spectacular, and it was great.

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A few days later, we're shooting the
part where we're going up, jumping the

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Canyon of Death or whatever it was,
making it up to the top of the ramp.

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We're shooting that, and just as I found
out we were shooting that, I saddled

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myself over to Hal Needham, and I got up
next to him, and I said,

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Hey, Hal, you know, wouldn't it be kind
of cool if somebody went up there and

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they didn't quite make it and they fell
all the way to the bottom?

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And he just looked at me and he laughed
and he goes, how much is that going to

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00:13:58,420 --> 00:13:59,420
cost me, Hollywood?

213
00:13:59,640 --> 00:14:00,640
Barely making it.

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00:14:00,980 --> 00:14:03,340
And Mike Miranda is out.

215
00:14:03,880 --> 00:14:05,020
Being a stuntman.

216
00:14:05,660 --> 00:14:10,360
I did the same thing. I'd look for a
spot to go talk to the director and say,

217
00:14:10,460 --> 00:14:13,740
hey, what if while you're doing that
scene, what if the guy did a fall over

218
00:14:13,740 --> 00:14:16,660
here or something, you know? So I picked
up a lot of stunts like that. And so

219
00:14:16,660 --> 00:14:19,920
that's what he was doing. He said, hey,
listen, what if I come over here and I

220
00:14:19,920 --> 00:14:23,720
slid off and I went in the water or
whatever it might be? And I said, do it.

221
00:14:23,760 --> 00:14:27,560
You know, I mean, if he wanted to make a
few bucks, I'm willing to go for that.

222
00:14:28,290 --> 00:14:32,010
Now, not being a Hollywood stuntman, but
knowing that Hal Needham came from these

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00:14:32,010 --> 00:14:34,550
big stunt movies, I thought, oh, this is
going to be great. There'll probably be

224
00:14:34,550 --> 00:14:38,630
helicopters filming overhead and these
giant airbags.

225
00:14:39,470 --> 00:14:43,510
No, we were on a budget. I fell into
three cardboard boxes. That's it, into

226
00:14:43,510 --> 00:14:44,510
cardboard boxes.

227
00:14:45,110 --> 00:14:49,130
And, you know, the funny thing was, you
know, I'm no stuntman, like I said. So

228
00:14:49,130 --> 00:14:52,410
all I tried to do was fall and, you
know, try to dive off and make sure I

229
00:14:52,410 --> 00:14:53,450
landed flat on my back.

230
00:14:53,850 --> 00:14:56,270
And nobody told me, hey, don't hold your
breath.

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When I hit those boxes, all my wind came
out, man. And I was like, oh, and I

232
00:15:01,780 --> 00:15:02,840
scrambled out of the boxes.

233
00:15:03,100 --> 00:15:05,840
And people were clapping. And Hal
Needham was right there when I stepped

234
00:15:05,840 --> 00:15:09,160
out of the box. How about another take?

235
00:15:12,800 --> 00:15:17,660
First of all, we came to Canada because
at that time, the American dollar was

236
00:15:17,660 --> 00:15:20,860
stronger. And so we could get more for
less here.

237
00:15:22,460 --> 00:15:28,240
So I decided I'd shot a movie up here in
Canada, in Calgary, in fact, called

238
00:15:28,240 --> 00:15:30,860
Little Big Man. So I kind of knew the
area.

239
00:15:31,300 --> 00:15:35,000
So I called the film commissioner and
told him what I was looking for, and I

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00:15:35,000 --> 00:15:38,580
knew what I wanted, and they understood
real quick. So it worked out.

241
00:15:39,120 --> 00:15:45,160
Calgary was, Calgary, basically, we went
to Calgary because Calgary was one of

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00:15:45,160 --> 00:15:47,760
the first places to actually embrace.

243
00:15:48,410 --> 00:15:51,190
and help finance movies, you know, and
incentives.

244
00:15:51,730 --> 00:15:58,550
And they had a commission, basically
opened the doors, you know,

245
00:15:58,550 --> 00:16:03,130
for Cochran and for Calgary to us and
gave us access to everything. So we knew

246
00:16:03,130 --> 00:16:04,390
that park, everything around.

247
00:16:04,630 --> 00:16:06,850
And also we could fly nonstop from Los
Angeles.

248
00:16:07,810 --> 00:16:12,490
That was a great hotel deal. You know,
made it really fun and easy for us to

249
00:16:12,490 --> 00:16:13,490
make the movie there.

250
00:16:13,640 --> 00:16:18,020
You know, this is my backyard, being
here in Calgary and in Cochrane shooting

251
00:16:18,020 --> 00:16:21,100
this movie. So I was living this double
life for a while. I had a trailer.

252
00:16:21,680 --> 00:16:26,780
I had a little chair with my name on it.
Yet I knew all along that, you know, the

253
00:16:26,780 --> 00:16:30,200
jackass that I really was, yet here I
was sort of placed in this sort of

254
00:16:30,200 --> 00:16:34,460
special spot. So I was kind of living
this double life as some sort of a fancy

255
00:16:34,460 --> 00:16:35,720
guy on the set, yet...

256
00:16:36,170 --> 00:16:40,010
There was my friends in the audience or
people hanging around that I knew. So it

257
00:16:40,010 --> 00:16:43,650
was a weird sort of double existence for
me, but I don't think I ever, well,

258
00:16:43,750 --> 00:16:47,850
maybe I did, but I don't think I ever
lost touch with the reality of it. But

259
00:16:47,850 --> 00:16:52,190
it was very surreal to be here, to be in
this place, my home, a place I'd been

260
00:16:52,190 --> 00:16:56,790
in, and yet now it had been descended
upon by this filmmaking crew.

261
00:16:57,010 --> 00:17:00,790
And to this day, people ask me, well,
are you enjoying your visit from L.A.?

262
00:17:00,790 --> 00:17:03,810
No, no, I live here all the time.

263
00:17:05,010 --> 00:17:10,910
No, I really don't remember Cochran
much. It was a small town, and I had

264
00:17:10,910 --> 00:17:14,250
never heard of it. But, you know, I'm
like most Americans. I couldn't tell you

265
00:17:14,250 --> 00:17:15,490
who the king of Canada is.

266
00:17:16,150 --> 00:17:20,190
On a movie set, there's often click.

267
00:17:20,869 --> 00:17:23,369
And certainly the writers were a click.

268
00:17:23,670 --> 00:17:26,890
The cast was another click. The crew was
another click.

269
00:17:27,270 --> 00:17:31,710
Generally at the daily screenings, that
was an opportunity for most of us to

270
00:17:31,710 --> 00:17:36,340
mix. Since I was heavily involved in the
stunt, I did spend a lot of time with

271
00:17:36,340 --> 00:17:37,340
the stunt writers.

272
00:17:37,720 --> 00:17:42,340
That, to me, really what a masterful
director will do. He takes all these

273
00:17:42,340 --> 00:17:47,100
factions. He had old Hollywood with
people like Jack Weston. He had young

274
00:17:47,100 --> 00:17:48,540
Hollywood with people like Laurie.

275
00:17:48,780 --> 00:17:52,420
He had the BMX people. He had me, the
token Olympic guy.

276
00:17:52,700 --> 00:17:57,920
And yet, he made us all feel like we had
an important part in the film. He makes

277
00:17:57,920 --> 00:18:00,180
the dailies a party for the cast and
crew.

278
00:18:00,580 --> 00:18:04,890
It's an opportunity. for them to
celebrate what they did, blow some steam

279
00:18:04,890 --> 00:18:09,470
off, have some drinks, and to watch
these great action sequences in an

280
00:18:09,470 --> 00:18:14,010
atmosphere with all the riders, and it
demystified the process.

281
00:18:14,310 --> 00:18:15,350
It was unforgettable.

282
00:18:16,030 --> 00:18:20,830
Even though we were from completely
diverse backgrounds, he made us all feel

283
00:18:20,830 --> 00:18:22,150
like we were part of something special.

284
00:18:22,410 --> 00:18:26,430
And he did it in his own way. I mean,
he's old Hollywood, rough, tough, hard

285
00:18:26,430 --> 00:18:27,910
-drinking kind of tough guy.

286
00:18:28,410 --> 00:18:32,710
And yet he made us all feel like we were
family. It was beautiful.

287
00:18:33,610 --> 00:18:36,390
Working with Hal Needham was definitely
an experience.

288
00:18:36,810 --> 00:18:42,010
When he wanted something done, you did
it. I mean, it was like, either you do

289
00:18:42,010 --> 00:18:43,310
it or I'll get your sister to do it.

290
00:18:43,790 --> 00:18:48,350
you know and and it's like okay so you
did it it was just the way he he put

291
00:18:48,350 --> 00:18:55,070
things in perspective and uh this whole
stuntman mentality got it done well

292
00:18:55,070 --> 00:19:00,550
with the bigger films you got big stars
you got bigger budget a little more time

293
00:19:00,550 --> 00:19:05,210
and you can do more spectacular things
and all that and rad

294
00:19:06,000 --> 00:19:10,260
I mean, we were up against it with
budget, with time, with everything. So

295
00:19:10,260 --> 00:19:14,140
you had to be pretty creative and take
advantage of everything you could.

296
00:19:14,940 --> 00:19:19,040
As an actor, obviously, my favorite
parts were getting to act with Talia

297
00:19:19,040 --> 00:19:24,080
Shire and Laurie and Jack and these
wonderful people.

298
00:19:24,320 --> 00:19:30,800
I think Hal, Bill, Laurie, the whole
crew, Marta, who played my girlfriend,

299
00:19:30,920 --> 00:19:35,160
they were all very generous and kind to
me, knowing that I was so out of my

300
00:19:35,160 --> 00:19:37,040
element and basically so incapable.

301
00:19:37,900 --> 00:19:41,220
So I think the best memory that I have
are just those...

302
00:19:41,740 --> 00:19:44,780
Those friendship scenes that we shot
throughout the whole movie, hanging out,

303
00:19:44,820 --> 00:19:48,280
getting their guidance, you know, just
relax, helping me out, those are the

304
00:19:48,280 --> 00:19:49,520
best memories that I have.

305
00:19:49,740 --> 00:19:54,200
Hal tends to undershoot. He doesn't
shoot a lot of close-ups. It's a lot of

306
00:19:54,200 --> 00:19:58,260
masters, and then on to the next thing.
He's an action director. He wants to cut

307
00:19:58,260 --> 00:20:01,000
to the chase, literally and
figuratively.

308
00:20:01,500 --> 00:20:05,760
So the dialogue scenes were smooth.

309
00:20:06,770 --> 00:20:11,450
And I was surrounded by professionals,
so it went very quickly. The action

310
00:20:11,450 --> 00:20:16,030
sequence days were more difficult.

311
00:20:16,450 --> 00:20:22,250
We're talking injuries. We're talking
teenage kids, 15-, 16-year-old kids out

312
00:20:22,250 --> 00:20:26,110
there doing stunts on a major movie for
the first time in their lives. So there

313
00:20:26,110 --> 00:20:28,310
was a lot going on. There was a lot of
moving parts.

314
00:20:28,650 --> 00:20:33,630
It required a lot of cuts, a lot of
angles, a lot of...

315
00:20:34,889 --> 00:20:39,290
really output by the bikers. I mean,
those kids really worked their butts off

316
00:20:39,290 --> 00:20:45,950
in there. And, you know, you know, in
order to get that much footage of

317
00:20:45,950 --> 00:20:50,130
something, you got to have angles and
cameras and do it over and over and

318
00:20:50,130 --> 00:20:53,930
over. And they never gave up and they
never said, I'm tired. They never,

319
00:20:53,950 --> 00:20:57,910
nothing. They were ready all the time.
Well, you know, it's exciting and it's

320
00:20:57,910 --> 00:21:01,550
boring. You're there, you're shooting a
scene, you're riding, you're energetic,

321
00:21:01,630 --> 00:21:02,930
and then it comes cut.

322
00:21:03,480 --> 00:21:07,020
And then you'd sit around for two and a
half hours. And that was time for

323
00:21:07,020 --> 00:21:10,940
shenanigans. We played a lot of
practical jokes during those times.

324
00:21:11,240 --> 00:21:12,800
And I got away with murder.

325
00:21:13,020 --> 00:21:17,660
It was the second time I'd been a lead
in a motion picture. That's very

326
00:21:17,660 --> 00:21:23,100
exciting to be around all these amazing
athletes and these wonderful actors.

327
00:21:23,480 --> 00:21:28,080
I can tell you it's very daunting to,
quote, carry a film.

328
00:21:28,650 --> 00:21:33,450
It seems silly, but it's not when it's
your first time out of the gate, really,

329
00:21:33,570 --> 00:21:35,950
as a big national release.

330
00:21:36,790 --> 00:21:39,750
And all you want to do is do the best
you can.

331
00:21:40,070 --> 00:21:44,030
You look around the set, and you're
seeing people who are the best at what

332
00:21:44,030 --> 00:21:44,869
they do.

333
00:21:44,870 --> 00:21:48,830
And you look in the mirror, and you go,
well, who am I? When that camera turns

334
00:21:48,830 --> 00:21:50,570
on, you've got to turn it on.

335
00:21:51,030 --> 00:21:53,990
So I was supported by the best.

336
00:21:54,350 --> 00:21:59,830
players, had an amazing director, an
amazing cast around me, so there was no

337
00:21:59,830 --> 00:22:02,330
reason why I should do a horrible job.

338
00:22:02,550 --> 00:22:07,150
I was a trained actor by that time. I
had a couple of chops in my bag of

339
00:22:07,150 --> 00:22:10,570
tricks, but it is a nerve-wracking
process.

340
00:22:11,030 --> 00:22:14,070
I gotta tell you, I had nothing to do
with the music.

341
00:22:14,570 --> 00:22:18,690
Nothing. But they brought in whoever it
was, I'm telling you.

342
00:22:19,120 --> 00:22:22,440
The first time I heard it, I said, God
damn, that's good.

343
00:22:22,760 --> 00:22:27,580
I mean, that stuff's going to work. And
I listen, as I watch it with audiences,

344
00:22:27,860 --> 00:22:30,700
I listen to them, and they really like
that music.

345
00:22:31,280 --> 00:22:32,860
It's a jump. Well,

346
00:22:33,660 --> 00:22:34,740
it's an expensive needle drop.

347
00:22:34,940 --> 00:22:38,480
Very expensive song, especially when
there were giant hits, the biggest hits

348
00:22:38,480 --> 00:22:41,540
of that time. But Break the Ice was the
one that I think got a lot of MTV

349
00:22:41,540 --> 00:22:48,200
players. I mean, it's classic 80s rock,
and, you know, it...

350
00:22:48,490 --> 00:22:49,830
The music is incredible.

351
00:22:50,110 --> 00:22:53,490
And, you know, how lucky we are that we
had that, you know, outstanding

352
00:22:53,490 --> 00:22:57,610
soundtrack. And that music so captures
that time period.

353
00:22:57,890 --> 00:23:01,490
When you hear that music, you hear those
soundtracks, you think of the movie Rad.

354
00:23:11,110 --> 00:23:13,930
What is the best scene of Rad? The very
beginning?

355
00:23:14,560 --> 00:23:15,560
The very end.

356
00:23:15,740 --> 00:23:18,160
Yeah, they talk about the very
beginning, the end, and the dance scene.

357
00:23:18,540 --> 00:23:20,260
The dance scene is the most talked about
scene.

358
00:23:20,700 --> 00:23:24,480
But when you get the hardcore bikers and
they come in to see the movie, the

359
00:23:24,480 --> 00:23:27,840
beginning and the end. There you go.
It's the roots, it's the blend, and it

360
00:23:27,840 --> 00:23:29,560
was accepted by everybody because...

361
00:23:29,870 --> 00:23:34,010
What you were seeing in the freestyle
opening credits were probably the best

362
00:23:34,010 --> 00:23:39,630
riders. Ron Wilkerson, R.L. Osborne,
Martin, Eddie, Mike Dominguez. Those are

363
00:23:39,630 --> 00:23:42,270
the pioneers and they're legends and
they're still riding today.

364
00:23:42,590 --> 00:23:47,510
It sure sets the tone for what these
guys can do and what you're about to

365
00:23:47,510 --> 00:23:51,290
see. First time we saw them in the movie
theater, it's the first time most of us

366
00:23:51,290 --> 00:23:54,670
saw that scene because we were the BMX
racers, so we didn't see the freestyle.

367
00:23:54,890 --> 00:23:58,350
The first thing I noticed was, hey, I
know where that's at. That's down at

368
00:23:58,350 --> 00:24:01,690
Torrance Beach. The locals call it
burnout. Everybody showed up at Wizard

369
00:24:01,690 --> 00:24:05,670
Publications, and it was an overcast
day.

370
00:24:05,910 --> 00:24:07,830
We were all just supposed to sit there.

371
00:24:08,320 --> 00:24:10,460
and wait to find out where we were going
to film this.

372
00:24:10,680 --> 00:24:16,400
But because of the overcast and the
fogginess of the street, they decided to

373
00:24:16,400 --> 00:24:18,980
film right then and there, right there
on the street. Every once in a while,

374
00:24:18,980 --> 00:24:21,960
have fun. That's getting you to have a
good time. We looked at that and went,

375
00:24:22,020 --> 00:24:25,840
well, I mean, come on. I mean, it's got
to be the first thing you see in the

376
00:24:25,840 --> 00:24:28,480
movie. Okay, dude, let's walk this
sucker.

377
00:24:28,780 --> 00:24:29,780
All right.

378
00:24:30,940 --> 00:24:35,060
The whole paper route thing was great.
The holding the paper route and the dog

379
00:24:35,060 --> 00:24:37,580
grabbing it and, you know, a race
against the clock.

380
00:24:37,940 --> 00:24:42,120
Pat Romano is the girl and starts taking
off on a wheelie. I'm crew at that time.

381
00:24:42,300 --> 00:24:47,260
Oh, you can tell. If you're a BMX pro,
you can tell when it's Eddie and when

382
00:24:47,260 --> 00:24:50,800
it's Bill Allen pedaling. Just a
different style. The most intricate part

383
00:24:50,800 --> 00:24:55,960
of the scene, I believe, is Eddie going
into the swimming pool and then doing

384
00:24:55,960 --> 00:24:56,960
the 180.

385
00:24:57,280 --> 00:25:02,060
He can do that in his sleep. I think the
paper route is really a great, great

386
00:25:02,060 --> 00:25:07,060
opening for this movie in that it just
gives a great representative of what

387
00:25:07,060 --> 00:25:08,059
bicycles mean.

388
00:25:08,060 --> 00:25:11,580
It all sets his character that, you
know, he's polite and nice, but he will

389
00:25:11,580 --> 00:25:14,500
push the rules. And people look forward
to him. When I think about, you know,

390
00:25:14,580 --> 00:25:18,900
Ray Walsh getting the coffee cups
knocked out of his hand.

391
00:25:19,200 --> 00:25:21,820
Oops. The world would be a lot better
off.

392
00:25:23,850 --> 00:25:28,730
And who's the guy who says, the porch,
the porch. I said, the porch. The porch.

393
00:25:29,360 --> 00:25:30,360
I mean,

394
00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:36,460
it's just so great because these, you
know, typical irreverent teenagers, you

395
00:25:36,460 --> 00:25:42,160
know, that I think really identified
with lots of teenage boys at that time

396
00:25:42,160 --> 00:25:45,600
because they were, you know, they were a
little bit rebels and they were a little

397
00:25:45,600 --> 00:25:51,280
bit like punk and they're always trying
to get away with something. And that to

398
00:25:51,280 --> 00:25:55,820
me was, you know, I think it set the
mood for the film right off the top.

399
00:25:56,040 --> 00:25:57,920
No, he may not be the perfect kid.

400
00:25:59,100 --> 00:26:01,400
He has fun and he'll push the rules,
doesn't break the rules.

401
00:26:02,720 --> 00:26:09,640
The first day that I was on the film was
when we were shooting

402
00:26:09,640 --> 00:26:12,940
at the lumber mill and the little
hangout area.

403
00:26:13,180 --> 00:26:17,440
And that to me was a great way to begin
because it didn't actually require any

404
00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:20,940
acting, which is pretty good for me if I
don't have to do that.

405
00:26:21,140 --> 00:26:23,620
But what it enabled me was to be able to
ride the bike.

406
00:26:25,550 --> 00:26:29,330
and the team were subtly happy that, you
know, at least you don't look like a

407
00:26:29,330 --> 00:26:30,710
total moron on the bike.

408
00:26:30,950 --> 00:26:34,010
So it was a great way for me to start,
because I could do something I felt

409
00:26:34,010 --> 00:26:37,270
comfortable. I could ride the bike, I
could laugh and goof and roll over, you

410
00:26:37,270 --> 00:26:41,050
know, the garbage can and all the rest
of it. I think Luke, historically, and

411
00:26:41,050 --> 00:26:45,230
I'd have to check with the creative
geniuses behind the whole script, but I

412
00:26:45,230 --> 00:26:51,090
think Luke has always had desires to be
crew in a lot of different ways, and had

413
00:26:51,090 --> 00:26:55,550
circumstances been different, you know,
I think that he would have preferred the

414
00:26:55,550 --> 00:26:59,290
chase and probably would have been
successful as well. But, you know, I

415
00:26:59,290 --> 00:27:01,110
understood my place in this movie, my
friend.

416
00:27:01,450 --> 00:27:03,950
And that was a second fiddle to Mr.
Jones.

417
00:27:04,150 --> 00:27:05,570
And I was happy to be there.

418
00:27:05,790 --> 00:27:11,470
The police chase in the lumber yard was
fun for me because I'm actually up on

419
00:27:11,470 --> 00:27:15,750
lumber and looking about 40, 50 feet
down. And you had the motorcycle going

420
00:27:15,750 --> 00:27:17,810
through the scenes. It's a kid's...

421
00:27:18,080 --> 00:27:22,700
So we had a lot of fun shooting that,
and there was a lot of leeway in how we

422
00:27:22,700 --> 00:27:27,180
shot it and how it came together in the
editing room. Whenever you don't see

423
00:27:27,180 --> 00:27:33,480
Bill's face, it's pretty much me from
the legs down. My knees, my shins, my

424
00:27:33,480 --> 00:27:38,500
ankles. The dirty little secret is that
I was not allowed to ride a bike as a

425
00:27:38,500 --> 00:27:43,540
child. My mother watched my brother
nearly get smeared all over the pavement

426
00:27:43,540 --> 00:27:44,980
when I was probably eight.

427
00:27:45,450 --> 00:27:50,330
years old, maybe a little younger. So I
was never allowed to ride a bike. I knew

428
00:27:50,330 --> 00:27:54,970
how to ride a bike, but that was not
part of my upbringing.

429
00:27:55,590 --> 00:27:56,590
Music was.

430
00:27:57,250 --> 00:28:02,750
So there's a couple of scenes where you
can pick this out. When I'm coming

431
00:28:02,750 --> 00:28:09,470
through the fence and the Hell Track
sign pops up, man, I'm barely able to

432
00:28:09,470 --> 00:28:12,690
hang on to that bike. So if you compare
that rider...

433
00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:17,240
To the guy in the qualifying races,
you're going to see a little bit of

434
00:28:17,240 --> 00:28:20,460
difference. But anyway, it was the best
I could do at the time.

435
00:28:20,660 --> 00:28:25,900
And I was so impressed that Bill Allen
actually learned how to ride a bike

436
00:28:25,900 --> 00:28:27,200
during the movie Rad.

437
00:28:27,480 --> 00:28:29,620
And he got better and better as time
progressed.

438
00:28:30,020 --> 00:28:33,620
If you watch the film today on a big
screen, yeah, you can pick out times

439
00:28:33,620 --> 00:28:37,660
where the stuntmen are taking on our
role.

440
00:28:38,810 --> 00:28:43,090
Still, the stunt work is so spectacular,
it doesn't seem to matter, and that's

441
00:28:43,090 --> 00:28:44,130
why we're talking about it today.

442
00:28:44,430 --> 00:28:49,230
You can see through the lumber yard, or
the lumber, and you can see plywood up

443
00:28:49,230 --> 00:28:52,910
on there, and I had to make it look like
I was doing, you know, logs.

444
00:28:53,310 --> 00:28:54,310
Riding on logs, yeah.

445
00:28:54,530 --> 00:28:57,650
There's a scene in the lumber yard where
he's, you know, trying to get away from

446
00:28:57,650 --> 00:28:58,519
the police.

447
00:28:58,520 --> 00:29:00,020
It was going to be through a factory.

448
00:29:00,260 --> 00:29:03,620
And for some reason, the factory, he
wasn't happy with it, the director.

449
00:29:03,820 --> 00:29:06,620
And so he went out on his own and found
this lumber yard and said, we're going

450
00:29:06,620 --> 00:29:09,840
to shoot in this lumber yard. It's
actually the factory they used in Shoot

451
00:29:09,840 --> 00:29:16,660
to Kill. I think the thing I loved about
the police chase was

452
00:29:16,660 --> 00:29:19,760
just seeing H.B. Haggerty, the actor.

453
00:29:19,980 --> 00:29:22,140
And, you know, he's a former
professional wrestler.

454
00:29:22,920 --> 00:29:26,640
just to have that guy, knowing that he's
going to catch you. And that bike, that

455
00:29:26,640 --> 00:29:30,160
motorcycle, you know, again, you knew
that there was some behind-the-scenes

456
00:29:30,160 --> 00:29:33,900
stuff going on there. Obviously, he
wasn't riding that bike over those logs.

457
00:29:34,960 --> 00:29:37,800
It was still cool. That was a realistic
scene. When we were kids, we did that

458
00:29:37,800 --> 00:29:38,759
exact same thing.

459
00:29:38,760 --> 00:29:40,740
Knott's Prairie Farm would have the
donkey trails.

460
00:29:41,220 --> 00:29:43,620
And in the daytime, they had the donkeys
going through the trails. But at

461
00:29:43,620 --> 00:29:46,820
nighttime, they'd close it. We'd hook
our bikes over the top, get on top of

462
00:29:46,820 --> 00:29:47,820
the platform, shoot up.

463
00:29:47,880 --> 00:29:52,680
20 of us would be bolting through the
donkey trails, all wet and just mud all

464
00:29:52,680 --> 00:29:54,860
over us. But that's the kind of thing
you do. When you're a kid, you did that

465
00:29:54,860 --> 00:29:56,080
type of stuff. And I thought it was
authentic.

466
00:29:56,360 --> 00:30:00,220
Oh, yeah. Now, I remember, you know,
going down the street on a late night

467
00:30:00,220 --> 00:30:04,160
and putting my bike on some church roof
and starting riding the roof trail.

468
00:30:05,060 --> 00:30:09,040
So yeah, it's as real as it gets. I
think the cool thing about the parade

469
00:30:09,040 --> 00:30:11,440
scene was that it involved the whole
community.

470
00:30:12,000 --> 00:30:15,440
And that was typical of Hal Needham. He
figured out a way, let's get the whole

471
00:30:15,440 --> 00:30:19,320
community involved in this and let them
feel a part of this picture. So all of

472
00:30:19,320 --> 00:30:24,300
those folks lining the streets, they're
all locals. And they felt like they

473
00:30:24,300 --> 00:30:27,400
mattered and their part in the film was
essential.

474
00:30:27,740 --> 00:30:31,580
One thing people might not know about my
participation in the parade scene, about

475
00:30:31,580 --> 00:30:36,480
a month before the film was shot up in
Canada, I was doing a gymnastics tour

476
00:30:36,480 --> 00:30:38,200
and I was performing in an exhibition.

477
00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:42,460
And I landed on a dismount and I
completely dislocated. my knee because

478
00:30:42,460 --> 00:30:47,820
my leg was in an immobilizer I couldn't
straighten my leg so I had to get out of

479
00:30:47,820 --> 00:30:53,080
the car and walk back and talk to Lori
in her car and I had to keep both knees

480
00:30:53,080 --> 00:30:57,240
bent as I walked along and they shot me
from the waist up so it didn't look like

481
00:30:57,240 --> 00:31:02,300
I was limping so you know for me when I
think of that scene it looks like okay

482
00:31:02,300 --> 00:31:06,400
I'm going back to flirt with Lori but
all I can remember is I was walking

483
00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:10,020
along like this and they were shooting
me from the waist up but

484
00:31:11,020 --> 00:31:12,020
Yeah, it was fun.

485
00:31:14,060 --> 00:31:19,480
The bicycle boogie scene is probably the
most celebrated part of the movie. It's

486
00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:22,700
been recreated at weddings, I
understand.

487
00:31:23,140 --> 00:31:27,060
Man, the music is what made it because
even to this day you hear Send Me An

488
00:31:27,060 --> 00:31:28,800
Angel and your brain just goes boom.

489
00:31:42,920 --> 00:31:46,920
Let me tell you, it speaks for itself. I
remember thinking, I don't know how he's

490
00:31:46,920 --> 00:31:49,020
going to edit it together. I don't know
how it's going to work.

491
00:31:49,220 --> 00:31:54,660
The whole idea was Saturday Night Fever,
Flashdance. These movies for this

492
00:31:54,660 --> 00:31:56,540
audience, you need a dance sequence.

493
00:31:56,820 --> 00:32:00,660
Okay, so they could have danced
romantically, gone there on a bike,

494
00:32:00,700 --> 00:32:05,100
danced romantically like a normal kind
of scene. Or we could do a dance. We

495
00:32:05,100 --> 00:32:06,100
need a dance in the movie.

496
00:32:06,530 --> 00:32:09,810
It has to be on bikes. So let's do it on
bikes then. And everyone looked at us

497
00:32:09,810 --> 00:32:14,170
like we were from Mars, obviously. And
everybody worked really hard on it. And

498
00:32:14,170 --> 00:32:18,750
how to put it in a sequence, which I
think worked so well. I mean, it was the

499
00:32:18,750 --> 00:32:20,250
80s. And the flashing everywhere.

500
00:32:20,850 --> 00:32:24,370
That's what it was. It was trying to
have a great dance sequence for the

501
00:32:24,370 --> 00:32:27,710
audience. but do it on bikes, because
everything on the movie is done on

502
00:32:27,710 --> 00:32:33,290
bikes. Yeah, you know, a lot of the BMX
guys, we don't dance, you know, so I

503
00:32:33,290 --> 00:32:36,610
don't know where they came up with that.
You know, Hollywood, I guess.

504
00:32:36,950 --> 00:32:41,030
I remember Hal Needham saying, how the
hell are we going to pull this off?

505
00:32:41,450 --> 00:32:46,310
First of all, I think that would be
impossible to do a couple of things that

506
00:32:46,310 --> 00:32:47,930
we did in there for real.

507
00:32:48,250 --> 00:32:49,350
So I built...

508
00:32:49,640 --> 00:32:55,160
A platform on wheels that would hold the
bikes up like this so they could sit on

509
00:32:55,160 --> 00:32:58,840
them and pedal and do all that kind of
stuff and spin the wheels and turn

510
00:32:58,840 --> 00:32:59,719
around everything.

511
00:32:59,720 --> 00:33:06,120
I think my stunt career, my creativity
in stunts and coming up with new

512
00:33:06,120 --> 00:33:09,740
equipment and things like that, I think
it all came together right there on that

513
00:33:09,740 --> 00:33:10,740
thing to make it work.

514
00:33:10,880 --> 00:33:15,940
They had me on dollies a lot of time
with the bike in fixed position. If you

515
00:33:15,940 --> 00:33:19,580
see the one where I'm... on the bike and
kind of doing the bunny hop.

516
00:33:19,920 --> 00:33:20,859
It's silly.

517
00:33:20,860 --> 00:33:23,660
Yeah, I was the guy on the balance beam.
The balance beam was actually, you know,

518
00:33:23,660 --> 00:33:25,580
a normal balance beam is like this. It
was double the width.

519
00:33:25,820 --> 00:33:28,060
But it was still normal height, so I had
to bunny hop on that.

520
00:33:28,520 --> 00:33:31,960
Then it was both myself and Pat Romano,
that very first scene when we went over

521
00:33:31,960 --> 00:33:32,619
the camera.

522
00:33:32,620 --> 00:33:35,360
I was the first guy, Pat was the second
guy. We almost hit the camera.

523
00:33:35,620 --> 00:33:38,220
Then we went in there and started doing
all our tricks and that stuff. And not

524
00:33:38,220 --> 00:33:41,660
only that, but the lighting was such
that...

525
00:33:42,120 --> 00:33:47,660
When I was using doubles, you couldn't
see who it was, but yet you could see

526
00:33:47,660 --> 00:33:52,520
the outline, and you knew that it was
supposed to be them. In your mind, it's

527
00:33:52,520 --> 00:33:54,360
them when you're looking at it on the
screen.

528
00:33:54,780 --> 00:33:57,160
So you were in the white pants, on the
high heel?

529
00:33:57,440 --> 00:33:58,440
At one point.

530
00:33:58,580 --> 00:34:00,500
Just at one point. I knew that was
coming.

531
00:34:00,820 --> 00:34:05,200
And obviously the song, you know, helped
a lot, and that was, you know, we were

532
00:34:05,200 --> 00:34:08,679
fortunate to find that song. I don't
remember any other movie having that

533
00:34:08,679 --> 00:34:11,120
song in it. I mean, like, when you hear
that song, it's like...

534
00:34:11,449 --> 00:34:13,909
There's a rat. The rat's on TV. I can
hear it.

535
00:34:14,350 --> 00:34:17,810
Bike dancing. Who does bike dancing?
That's like great. Whatever we remember.

536
00:34:17,889 --> 00:34:21,449
The bicycle boogie is. And we haven't
called it bicycle boogie, but I've heard

537
00:34:21,449 --> 00:34:26,730
that many times. And when you brought it
up, that's really the moniker. But there

538
00:34:26,730 --> 00:34:30,310
was a Time magazine or Newsweek magazine
article back then, and there was a

539
00:34:30,310 --> 00:34:32,650
little blurb about the bicycle dance and
rat.

540
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:37,620
And it worked out pretty well, actually.
I remember when we were doing the

541
00:34:37,620 --> 00:34:42,000
bicycle boogie dance scene. When we were
filming it, they were actually playing

542
00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:46,120
White Wedding, Billy Idol, so we could
dance to it. Obviously, they didn't use

543
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:50,580
that for the movie, but that's the time
period that we're talking about. The

544
00:34:50,580 --> 00:34:52,639
fact that it's kind of cheesy makes
it...

545
00:34:52,989 --> 00:34:53,708
So cool.

546
00:34:53,710 --> 00:34:58,710
And the twins in those sort of space
outfits doing those funky push-ups.

547
00:34:58,990 --> 00:35:03,970
I mean, it was pure 80s gold, right?

548
00:35:05,810 --> 00:35:10,270
And they wanted me to dress kind of like
a Miami Vice kind of guy. That's why I

549
00:35:10,270 --> 00:35:12,670
had the sport coat pulled up and all
this stuff.

550
00:35:13,890 --> 00:35:18,670
You know, when you sign on to do a
movie, you go along with whatever the

551
00:35:18,670 --> 00:35:21,190
director wants you to do. So I said,
okay, I'm in.

552
00:35:21,670 --> 00:35:26,330
Come on, dude. I mean, that was out of
time at the time. You know, that was

553
00:35:26,330 --> 00:35:31,190
like so 70s. But it added to the
kitschiness and the flavor of it. So it

554
00:35:31,190 --> 00:35:32,009
was great.

555
00:35:32,010 --> 00:35:33,350
Hey, dude, we're going ass sliding.

556
00:35:33,550 --> 00:35:34,209
You want to come?

557
00:35:34,210 --> 00:35:37,830
No. Ass sliding with you guys? I'm going
to wait for my ass sliding with somebody

558
00:35:37,830 --> 00:35:40,010
special, you know? Oh, my coot, Katie.

559
00:35:40,990 --> 00:35:41,990
Well, maybe.

560
00:35:42,130 --> 00:35:43,130
Ass sliding.

561
00:35:44,860 --> 00:35:49,040
Just an unfortunate term. I don't know
how he came up with that. I don't know

562
00:35:49,040 --> 00:35:53,680
why, but that's what we were left with,
and that was a plot point in the movie,

563
00:35:53,700 --> 00:35:58,040
that Laurie and I go ass-sliding. As far
as the innovator of the ass-sliding,

564
00:35:58,140 --> 00:36:02,700
I've got to put that on Sam Bernard, and
I really need to talk to him more about

565
00:36:02,700 --> 00:36:04,500
that, because it's disturbing to me.

566
00:36:04,720 --> 00:36:10,500
It was maybe called something else, and
Hal loved it, and Hal really thought it

567
00:36:10,500 --> 00:36:13,140
was great, and I think it was almost...

568
00:36:13,390 --> 00:36:18,410
kind of a throwaway of, like, what are
these two kids going to do? And what

569
00:36:18,410 --> 00:36:21,630
would Crew do with the hottest baby
ever, like, seen in person?

570
00:36:21,870 --> 00:36:27,150
You know, it's just like, hey, let's go
ass-lighting. And it was just all just,

571
00:36:27,250 --> 00:36:30,710
in all the reviews and stuff, people,
like, in the special personal reviews, I

572
00:36:30,710 --> 00:36:33,990
want to go ass-lighting. In my mind, it
suited.

573
00:36:34,620 --> 00:36:38,880
what I had envisioned, all right? And it
looked like a slide. It looked like

574
00:36:38,880 --> 00:36:42,480
something maybe they might have built
just for that, you know? The unfortunate

575
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:47,140
thing about that is we're shooting in
Canada. There is no warm water in

576
00:36:47,140 --> 00:36:52,100
Canada. So us going into that mountain
stream, it was probably about 40-degree

577
00:36:52,100 --> 00:36:56,760
water, and we had a wet suit on, which
does no good if you're jumping in and

578
00:36:56,760 --> 00:37:00,260
out of the water. So it was fun and
refreshing.

579
00:37:00,540 --> 00:37:03,000
And so cold, parts of a man disappear.

580
00:37:03,920 --> 00:37:07,340
We'll talk about that some other time.
And I didn't, you know, even in the

581
00:37:07,340 --> 00:37:10,440
dailies, the little vignettes we saw
every day of what they shot the day

582
00:37:10,440 --> 00:37:12,200
before, we never saw that.

583
00:37:12,420 --> 00:37:14,560
So the first time I saw that was at the
premiere.

584
00:37:15,040 --> 00:37:19,800
And the aft sliding, the reason it's my
favorite is because we knew how cold

585
00:37:19,800 --> 00:37:20,840
that water had to be.

586
00:37:21,060 --> 00:37:25,220
So when we saw them hit the water, it
was like, oh, my gosh, that had to hurt.

587
00:37:25,340 --> 00:37:29,620
That had to hurt. That had to be a
one-take wonder, right? That water was

588
00:37:29,620 --> 00:37:30,620
ice.

589
00:37:30,820 --> 00:37:32,540
I mean, it was a killer.

590
00:37:32,980 --> 00:37:38,040
And even though you see it twice in the
movie, they only did it one time because

591
00:37:38,040 --> 00:37:39,480
they were freezing to death.

592
00:37:39,700 --> 00:37:44,220
So what I did was I had felt the water,
and I knew there was going to be

593
00:37:44,220 --> 00:37:46,720
rebellious about doing another one.

594
00:37:46,920 --> 00:37:52,280
So I put two cameras at the end of the
slide. I had one on the side and one

595
00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:53,520
looking right up the slide.

596
00:37:56,060 --> 00:38:00,120
The first time they did it, I used this
angle for them going into the water. And

597
00:38:00,120 --> 00:38:03,200
the last one, I used the one out here
because when they hit the water, the

598
00:38:03,200 --> 00:38:06,900
water just blocked them out to the
camera lens. So they only did it one

599
00:38:06,900 --> 00:38:09,320
time, but I tell you what, I knew they
were good.

600
00:38:09,760 --> 00:38:13,420
I knew I needed blankets and heaters and
things when they came out there.

601
00:38:18,200 --> 00:38:21,780
You over-rotated.

602
00:38:22,300 --> 00:38:23,340
No shit.

603
00:38:23,560 --> 00:38:25,420
One of the other great scenes was the
backflip.

604
00:38:25,820 --> 00:38:29,880
This was like, you know, the coming out
story of BMX. You know, all the riders,

605
00:38:30,080 --> 00:38:32,060
all the bike companies, everybody wanted
to be involved.

606
00:38:32,340 --> 00:38:35,880
You know, Teltrap was sponsored by
7-Eleven, you know, and it was in every

607
00:38:35,880 --> 00:38:39,580
7-Eleven in America. So everyone knew
what we were doing. So we were contacted

608
00:38:39,580 --> 00:38:43,740
about, well, there's this guy who can do
a backflip. A backflip? A backflip.

609
00:38:43,740 --> 00:38:47,360
Okay, we'll put that in. What does that
look like? I couldn't imagine really

610
00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:50,060
what it was going to look like. He went
home and did like a home video or

611
00:38:50,060 --> 00:38:52,860
something, a movie. Sent it up to us. We
looked at it.

612
00:38:53,100 --> 00:38:54,760
We can do this. We'll put this in.

613
00:38:55,310 --> 00:38:58,510
I don't even know how the subject came
up, but we were trying to think of all

614
00:38:58,510 --> 00:39:02,350
kinds of things that we could put in
that had never been done before, never

615
00:39:02,350 --> 00:39:03,750
been seen on film especially.

616
00:39:04,330 --> 00:39:06,590
And we heard about this kid and brought
him up there.

617
00:39:07,010 --> 00:39:11,130
And I said, you know, let me see what it
looks like.

618
00:39:11,410 --> 00:39:14,910
And he built a little ramp and he went
up there and come backward. And I said.

619
00:39:15,440 --> 00:39:17,100
Go no further. That's good enough.

620
00:39:17,420 --> 00:39:21,420
Well, we all knew it was Jose Yanez.
That was the only guy that could do

621
00:39:21,420 --> 00:39:23,180
backflips back then. He was fantastic.

622
00:39:23,660 --> 00:39:26,240
We were teammates on the same bicycle
team at the time.

623
00:39:26,540 --> 00:39:31,580
Even BMX pros, we were just amazed at
what that guy could do. To see him do a

624
00:39:31,580 --> 00:39:32,900
backflip on a bike was insane.

625
00:39:33,440 --> 00:39:35,300
He had toe clips and he would ride.

626
00:39:35,680 --> 00:39:39,840
Jose was not a talented rider. He
couldn't have rode a lap around a BMX

627
00:39:39,840 --> 00:39:40,840
track without crashing.

628
00:39:41,120 --> 00:39:43,120
But the guy could do these backflips.

629
00:39:43,320 --> 00:39:44,380
Oh, man, it was amazing.

630
00:39:44,920 --> 00:39:47,620
And he can't ride. He couldn't ride a
bike. He can't ride from here to there.

631
00:39:47,760 --> 00:39:50,840
He could just do a backflip. He could do
a backflip. The only one in the world.

632
00:39:51,080 --> 00:39:55,340
So, Jose, when he came out doing this
flip, I mean, like, nobody ever thought

633
00:39:55,340 --> 00:39:59,160
of doing flips, you know, and making it.
So, afterwards, I asked him, I said,

634
00:39:59,260 --> 00:40:03,290
how'd you learn to do that? And he said,
he lived at a... on a lake, and they had

635
00:40:03,290 --> 00:40:08,030
a boat ramp out there. And what he'd do,
he built a ramp on the end of the boat

636
00:40:08,030 --> 00:40:10,830
ramp, and he'd come down there, and he'd
do it into the water.

637
00:40:11,070 --> 00:40:15,410
Jose, actually, he was one of the first
guys to perfect a backflip at that time

638
00:40:15,410 --> 00:40:19,810
with that style. He had toe clips on his
bike, and he would practice into a lake,

639
00:40:19,910 --> 00:40:23,790
go off onto a lake over and over again.
So he had a really, really weird style

640
00:40:23,790 --> 00:40:27,310
of doing backflips compared to the X
Games type of styling of backflipping

641
00:40:27,310 --> 00:40:28,590
now. That kid did that thing.

642
00:40:29,360 --> 00:40:33,300
I don't know, half a dozen times, maybe
more, before he did the real backflip.

643
00:40:33,340 --> 00:40:38,420
But landing on those boards and those
mattresses, that wasn't a piece of cake,

644
00:40:38,580 --> 00:40:39,580
you know.

645
00:40:43,560 --> 00:40:46,360
See, if you let your head lead, your
body will just follow naturally.

646
00:40:46,890 --> 00:40:51,210
Really? Mm-hmm. And those lines about,
you know, like on the backflip, you

647
00:40:51,210 --> 00:40:55,010
know, you lead with your head because
your body follows your head. I mean,

648
00:40:55,010 --> 00:40:59,050
that all came from Hal, and he knows
that because Hal knew exactly what he

649
00:40:59,050 --> 00:41:01,550
was talking about in terms of air
awareness and how to flip.

650
00:41:02,130 --> 00:41:05,890
I remember Jose being there, and he
didn't get the backflip immediately.

651
00:41:06,250 --> 00:41:09,710
No. I think he probably did eight times.
A lot of times, yeah.

652
00:41:10,170 --> 00:41:13,330
He would come out and he'd practice his
flip and sometimes he'd make it and

653
00:41:13,330 --> 00:41:16,930
sometimes he wouldn't. But he got paid
per single flip to do that thing.

654
00:41:17,150 --> 00:41:20,930
And this was a big deal. This was like
Neil Armstrong landing on the moon.

655
00:41:21,150 --> 00:41:25,910
Now we've got guys doing double and
triple backflips. Well, Jose was the

656
00:41:25,910 --> 00:41:29,250
pioneer of this and he was the only guy
in the world who could do it. He could

657
00:41:29,250 --> 00:41:32,450
come out and he could do a backflip on a
bike, excuse me.

658
00:41:32,890 --> 00:41:38,610
So in preparing to do this stunt, there
would be complete silence on the set.

659
00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:43,640
Jose, I guess he was a religious guy. He
got religion at that time because he

660
00:41:43,640 --> 00:41:46,700
would get down on his knees and he would
pray that this stunt would go well.

661
00:41:46,940 --> 00:41:49,620
And it blew everyone's mind.

662
00:41:51,780 --> 00:41:56,360
You think now that, you know, the guys
in the X Games, I mean, they're doing

663
00:41:56,360 --> 00:41:57,800
backflips on snowmobiles.

664
00:41:58,480 --> 00:42:02,800
A backflip is no big deal. I'm a fat old
man now, and I can do them on a beach

665
00:42:02,800 --> 00:42:04,460
cruiser. It's just not a big deal now.

666
00:42:04,680 --> 00:42:11,580
But then it was incredible. And to have
a lineup of professional BMX racers

667
00:42:11,580 --> 00:42:18,180
stop what they're doing and just in awe
of what talent, really what

668
00:42:18,180 --> 00:42:21,240
guts that took to do the first one.

669
00:42:21,620 --> 00:42:26,280
And it still is impressive that he did
it so far before anyone else did it.

670
00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:27,880
Yeah, I was on the scene.

671
00:42:28,430 --> 00:42:33,670
on the set when Jose was doing his
famous backflip onto the mattress and I

672
00:42:33,670 --> 00:42:39,130
had to do some insert shots where I fell
into the frame but Jose had to do the

673
00:42:39,130 --> 00:42:41,310
actual shots where he got the wind
knocked out of him.

674
00:42:41,820 --> 00:42:45,400
And it wasn't supposed to work out, so
he was supposed to screw that up. He did

675
00:42:45,400 --> 00:42:46,118
a great job.

676
00:42:46,120 --> 00:42:47,120
Dude, he's a crazy nut.

677
00:42:47,700 --> 00:42:49,220
Jose is just crazy nut.

678
00:42:49,500 --> 00:42:53,740
I think the qualifying scenes, for me,
are the best part of the movie. It shows

679
00:42:53,740 --> 00:42:59,280
these guys, unadorned, going through
parks as fast as they can. And if you

680
00:42:59,280 --> 00:43:04,880
can watch Eddie Fiola and how fast he is
going on one of those one-speed BMX

681
00:43:04,880 --> 00:43:06,620
bikes, you can't believe it.

682
00:43:07,700 --> 00:43:08,700
How was it?

683
00:43:09,120 --> 00:43:10,480
So easy to choke.

684
00:43:18,759 --> 00:43:22,180
Even though we're supposed to be acting,
you're on your bike, you want to make it

685
00:43:22,180 --> 00:43:25,120
look dramatic and all that type of
stuff, once we got going, it was a real

686
00:43:25,120 --> 00:43:26,120
race.

687
00:43:30,720 --> 00:43:37,700
That is still another marvel to me, how
they put that all together, because

688
00:43:37,700 --> 00:43:41,860
all we knew was we would ride for 30
yards, cut, and that was it.

689
00:43:42,430 --> 00:43:46,110
You know, and then two hours later you
go, okay, we're going to ride down this

690
00:43:46,110 --> 00:43:48,190
trail. You're going to ride for 30 yards
and cut.

691
00:43:48,950 --> 00:43:51,370
You know, it took a couple of days of
shooting.

692
00:43:51,610 --> 00:43:54,250
The kids didn't understand. They think
if you're going to do a scene, you're

693
00:43:54,250 --> 00:43:56,650
going to do a race. You just do the
whole race. You know, they don't know.

694
00:43:56,690 --> 00:43:57,990
You have to do it in little bits and
pieces.

695
00:43:58,370 --> 00:44:01,930
So, like, when it's coming down that
real rocky hill with the water and

696
00:44:01,930 --> 00:44:04,030
everything, that was treacherous, you
know.

697
00:44:04,310 --> 00:44:07,590
And so I said, well, let's do it three
or four times. And they went, what,

698
00:44:07,590 --> 00:44:11,190
what, why, why, why? And I said, well, I
got to, you know, I'm doing a qualifying

699
00:44:11,190 --> 00:44:15,610
race. I got to do it three or four
times. But I had to teach them that, you

700
00:44:15,610 --> 00:44:17,370
know, you do it one piece at a time.

701
00:44:17,740 --> 00:44:22,480
They filmed the end five times and they
filmed the corner five times. They

702
00:44:22,480 --> 00:44:26,580
filmed a bunch of it. And then they, you
know, they placed the guys in the right.

703
00:44:27,299 --> 00:44:30,940
numerical order where they're supposed
to be inside the race. We couldn't

704
00:44:30,940 --> 00:44:34,380
understand a sequence because, you know,
Hal had his own system, and all we were

705
00:44:34,380 --> 00:44:37,840
knowing, we were running down, we were
racing through the park, coming back,

706
00:44:37,940 --> 00:44:40,960
racing through the park, going back and
forth, and we never knew how this thing

707
00:44:40,960 --> 00:44:44,260
was going to work out. Once we saw the
dailies, it was incredible how they

708
00:44:44,260 --> 00:44:45,260
really put that thing together.

709
00:44:45,540 --> 00:44:49,000
There's a lot of challenging parts, like
jumping over the hay bale, over the

710
00:44:49,000 --> 00:44:52,460
bridge. The hay bale was there. We saw
it, and since we're freestylers, we just

711
00:44:52,460 --> 00:44:55,000
decided to jump over the hay bale, and
they kept that in there. That was pretty

712
00:44:55,000 --> 00:44:56,000
cool.

713
00:44:56,880 --> 00:45:01,920
speaking line that got cut edited out i
was crushed uh my big can i do it for

714
00:45:01,920 --> 00:45:05,200
you now because i really think i you
deserve you know this this is an academy

715
00:45:05,200 --> 00:45:11,380
award-winning go for it to get that
that's all it was you know i don't

716
00:45:11,380 --> 00:45:14,600
remember who i said it to but i was
supposed to turn to them and this was uh

717
00:45:14,600 --> 00:45:20,040
during the qualifier i turned to the guy
next to me and said go for it that's it

718
00:45:20,040 --> 00:45:26,940
the best stuff left on the editing room
floor Well, in the trials, the prelims,

719
00:45:26,940 --> 00:45:31,120
my character was savagely taken out of
the race, I believe because he was

720
00:45:31,120 --> 00:45:35,220
targeted as a potential threat to all
the racers that would eventually make it

721
00:45:35,220 --> 00:45:38,220
to Hell Track. Oh, man, that's a tough
brake lift. I'm sorry.

722
00:45:38,900 --> 00:45:40,080
Gotta do it for all of us, dude.

723
00:45:41,020 --> 00:45:44,280
So I was taken out, which was
unfortunate. I ended up tackling my

724
00:45:44,280 --> 00:45:45,280
front wheel.

725
00:45:45,360 --> 00:45:48,800
I think that that wheel, they actually
put on a curb and stomped out from what

726
00:45:48,800 --> 00:45:52,220
I remember to get it to take its shape.
It was a very painful stunt performed

727
00:45:52,220 --> 00:45:53,220
not by myself.

728
00:45:53,580 --> 00:45:55,540
But I did watch it and cheer on those
who did it.

729
00:46:01,560 --> 00:46:05,080
Helltrap was the, as they say, set
piece.

730
00:46:05,630 --> 00:46:12,370
of the movie. It was the climactic theme
centered around a fictional track, and

731
00:46:12,370 --> 00:46:15,870
it has elements from almost every
discipline.

732
00:46:16,210 --> 00:46:21,070
The 20-foot drop-off at the beginning,
the little whoopty-doos, the cereal

733
00:46:21,070 --> 00:46:26,170
bowl. These are things you will not find
in conventional BMX racing, but it was

734
00:46:26,170 --> 00:46:30,650
done in such a way that it was exciting.

735
00:46:30,950 --> 00:46:32,790
Essentially, I wrote a 90-page script.

736
00:46:33,340 --> 00:46:36,780
And then I just had a page that said
Hell Track. And then the three of us sat

737
00:46:36,780 --> 00:46:40,720
down night after night. Hal Needham and
Robert Levy and I were talking and

738
00:46:40,720 --> 00:46:44,560
talking. I had Hal going on. Probably
took almost the same amount of time to

739
00:46:44,560 --> 00:46:48,200
write down Hell Track in about 15 pages
than it took to write the previous 90

740
00:46:48,200 --> 00:46:49,200
pages.

741
00:46:49,500 --> 00:46:53,380
That's the truth. To me, that's one of
the real important legacies that Hal

742
00:46:53,380 --> 00:46:57,980
Needham left is that, you know, had the
race track been just an average track,

743
00:46:59,150 --> 00:47:00,990
I think it would have still been cool.

744
00:47:01,370 --> 00:47:05,850
But being a Hollywood stuntman, it had
to be the most outrageous thing that

745
00:47:05,850 --> 00:47:06,850
anybody had seen.

746
00:47:06,930 --> 00:47:12,710
Well, Helltrack was created to be the
gnarliest, hardest, raddest track ever

747
00:47:12,710 --> 00:47:14,630
created in history.

748
00:47:14,850 --> 00:47:16,130
Helltrack was an experience.

749
00:47:16,370 --> 00:47:19,430
I mean, really, if you look at it, it
would have been what...

750
00:47:19,900 --> 00:47:21,540
A prelude to the new Supercross tracks.

751
00:47:21,920 --> 00:47:25,500
BMX back in the 80s, most of the courses
were fairly flat. They didn't have a lot

752
00:47:25,500 --> 00:47:26,660
of banks to the turn.

753
00:47:26,940 --> 00:47:30,740
It was a flat-out drag race. Who was the
fastest from A to B? Whoever got to the

754
00:47:30,740 --> 00:47:34,540
first corner first usually won. That
track was completely different. It was

755
00:47:34,540 --> 00:47:38,960
amped up to the next level. We get to
the site, and you're like, are you

756
00:47:38,960 --> 00:47:39,788
kidding me?

757
00:47:39,790 --> 00:47:43,830
This is not a BMX track. And you see the
one scene where Rick Moliterno's in the

758
00:47:43,830 --> 00:47:44,830
cast? Sign my cast?

759
00:47:45,050 --> 00:47:48,450
That was not fit up. That was a real
deal. The first, second time on the

760
00:47:48,450 --> 00:47:51,830
track to the moguls, he ended up
breaking his ankle. Don't be intimidated

761
00:47:51,830 --> 00:47:55,450
by those guys out there. Just go for it.
Thanks, Rick. Yeah, Rick actually, you

762
00:47:55,450 --> 00:47:59,370
know, with that broken leg and he having
crew sign it, he had actually broken his

763
00:47:59,370 --> 00:48:02,150
leg during rehearsals and practice in
the mogul.

764
00:48:02,440 --> 00:48:05,740
But I got to participate in the building
of the cereal bowl thing. So we had a

765
00:48:05,740 --> 00:48:08,620
little path in the middle of the cereal
bowl, and you had to go up the ramp on

766
00:48:08,620 --> 00:48:10,320
the cereal bowl platform and then off
it.

767
00:48:10,840 --> 00:48:14,060
And so I would test it, and I'd go off
it, and I knew it had a little spring on

768
00:48:14,060 --> 00:48:16,160
it, so I'd pull a little wheelie manual
and jump off.

769
00:48:16,510 --> 00:48:20,670
Well, Chris Phoenix comes on that thing,
and he's riding, and he pulled his front

770
00:48:20,670 --> 00:48:25,310
wheel a little bit premature, and his
front wheel goes over and then under.

771
00:48:25,730 --> 00:48:30,930
With his hand stuck on the handlebars.
No letting go and doing this or bailing

772
00:48:30,930 --> 00:48:34,910
the bike, and he went, and that was a
real... On film. That was like one of

773
00:48:34,910 --> 00:48:39,290
the big smashes of that whole day. He
really got Nick's good. For the rest of

774
00:48:39,290 --> 00:48:43,790
history, Chris Phoenix is our hero
because of that scene. It is so classic.

775
00:48:43,930 --> 00:48:45,930
Two days before he starts filming, it
starts to ring.

776
00:48:46,430 --> 00:48:50,350
Now we've created this mud, I don't know
what you want to call it. There's dirt

777
00:48:50,350 --> 00:48:52,370
everywhere. And now all of a sudden
there's mud everywhere.

778
00:48:52,650 --> 00:48:53,249
How much?

779
00:48:53,250 --> 00:48:57,250
Everything was mushy. Everything was
soft. It was difficult to ride.

780
00:48:57,490 --> 00:49:01,770
Some of the jumps, you can't tell, but
we laid plywood up the face of the jumps

781
00:49:01,770 --> 00:49:04,150
just so we could get air because it was
so soft.

782
00:49:04,470 --> 00:49:08,130
I don't even have stock car teams. I've
been racist with them. In the stock car

783
00:49:08,130 --> 00:49:09,810
world, they use a helicopter to drive
the track.

784
00:49:10,010 --> 00:49:12,050
That track was a mud hole.

785
00:49:12,590 --> 00:49:16,290
And I went, oh, my God, because I didn't
have a big budget on that film. You

786
00:49:16,290 --> 00:49:18,050
know, I was uptight for a time.

787
00:49:18,610 --> 00:49:23,010
And so I called production, said, give
me some helicopters.

788
00:49:23,930 --> 00:49:26,570
And an hour later, there are two
helicopters in the middle of this park,

789
00:49:26,610 --> 00:49:30,090
which I've now closed down. They spent
two days hovering over this track with

790
00:49:30,090 --> 00:49:32,070
helicopter blades. They could drive this
place down.

791
00:49:32,610 --> 00:49:34,690
Everybody was like, what's going on?

792
00:49:36,010 --> 00:49:37,710
Classic Hal Needham. We'll fix it.

793
00:49:38,090 --> 00:49:39,670
What do we need to do? Get us a
helicopter.

794
00:49:39,970 --> 00:49:41,230
Get us a helicopter, quick.

795
00:49:42,120 --> 00:49:43,120
And we had one.

796
00:49:44,140 --> 00:49:47,560
When the first time they went by, there
was water and mud going everywhere.

797
00:49:47,780 --> 00:49:51,900
And as they kept on, it kept getting
less and less. And finally, the bikers,

798
00:49:51,920 --> 00:49:53,560
the riders said, it's good.

799
00:49:53,780 --> 00:49:57,060
It was the most extreme track any of us
had ever seen at the time.

800
00:49:57,280 --> 00:50:01,840
A good example is the Hell Track Hill.
You had 25 of us that looked at that

801
00:50:01,840 --> 00:50:05,320
hill initially and went, no way. We
thought it was a backdrop to the movie.

802
00:50:05,400 --> 00:50:07,960
We didn't know we were actually going to
have to ride down it. You know, showing

803
00:50:07,960 --> 00:50:11,420
up and seeing this three-story downhill
was just...

804
00:50:12,640 --> 00:50:15,720
Unbelievable. There was a lot of the pro
athlete BMXers that were there.

805
00:50:16,060 --> 00:50:19,480
Once they looked down the hill, they had
the same thought. It's like, there's no

806
00:50:19,480 --> 00:50:20,880
way anybody's going to survive this.

807
00:50:21,140 --> 00:50:23,080
That wall costs $100,000.

808
00:50:23,680 --> 00:50:27,480
So I said, if I build this thing, we've
got to use it, you know?

809
00:50:28,120 --> 00:50:29,480
Nobody wanted to ride down it.

810
00:50:29,720 --> 00:50:30,720
Nobody wanted to.

811
00:50:30,840 --> 00:50:33,480
We got there, and the guys got together
with the director and said, we cannot

812
00:50:33,480 --> 00:50:34,480
ride down that.

813
00:50:35,260 --> 00:50:36,249
It's a wall.

814
00:50:36,250 --> 00:50:38,870
Nobody wanted to go down the track the
first time. Nobody wanted to take the

815
00:50:38,870 --> 00:50:41,230
walls the first time. It really was
scary.

816
00:50:41,570 --> 00:50:46,090
When they started, you know, I remember
probably smiling to myself going, wow,

817
00:50:46,150 --> 00:50:48,370
they're kind of scared to go down this
thing. That's pretty cool.

818
00:50:48,630 --> 00:50:51,610
You know, just to stand on top of that
wall was just terrifying.

819
00:50:51,830 --> 00:50:57,730
I mean, that's one of the things that's
so cool is that you have the best riders

820
00:50:57,730 --> 00:51:03,810
in the world, and Hal puts up this hell
track, and all these guys get out there

821
00:51:03,810 --> 00:51:04,950
and go, we're not doing it.

822
00:51:05,290 --> 00:51:07,150
No way are we going down that face.

823
00:51:07,410 --> 00:51:11,950
And I didn't blame him because, you
know, I did hot falls and things as a

824
00:51:11,950 --> 00:51:15,610
stuntman. And I got up there and looked
at it and I said, I wouldn't go off of

825
00:51:15,610 --> 00:51:18,970
here because I'm not a bike rider, you
know. Jose was the first one to

826
00:51:18,970 --> 00:51:23,730
actually, you know, just nut up, stand
up there, roll straight in.

827
00:51:24,050 --> 00:51:26,950
And when he got down to the bottom, he
looped out backwards.

828
00:51:27,190 --> 00:51:27,959
Oh, yeah.

829
00:51:27,960 --> 00:51:29,200
So he goes, well, that didn't work.

830
00:51:29,440 --> 00:51:33,420
Goes back to the top, leans a little
forward, just a little bit forward, and

831
00:51:33,420 --> 00:51:36,440
goes over the handlebars at the very
bottom. I don't know if Jose was quite

832
00:51:36,440 --> 00:51:39,360
all there. Again, he was the only guy
that could do the backflip at the time

833
00:51:39,360 --> 00:51:42,040
because none of the rest of us would try
it. I think they hauled him off because

834
00:51:42,040 --> 00:51:43,040
he was unconscious.

835
00:51:43,280 --> 00:51:46,700
So we're all standing there watching
this going, well, I'm not sure if I

836
00:51:46,700 --> 00:51:50,580
quite want to be next yet. But I think
Jose was the first one to go right from

837
00:51:50,580 --> 00:51:51,299
the top.

838
00:51:51,300 --> 00:51:54,660
Jose, he was kind of like our guinea
pig. We saw how he did it, and we said,

839
00:51:54,700 --> 00:51:56,540
don't do it that way. Yeah. Be the road
cram.

840
00:51:57,660 --> 00:52:01,900
was, you know, a freestyle ramp rider
back then. So they built a ladder, and

841
00:52:01,900 --> 00:52:05,420
he started going up step by step, and he
was actually the first guy to go down

842
00:52:05,420 --> 00:52:09,580
it. Beetle was the first one to go down.
I mean, like on a foot plant and then

843
00:52:09,580 --> 00:52:14,120
dropping in. He had a ladder. He put a
ladder up against the wall, carried his

844
00:52:14,120 --> 00:52:19,300
bike up there, and from the ladder, he
got on his bike and rode down about 20

845
00:52:19,300 --> 00:52:23,940
feet. So what we did is we went up a
couple steps, did like a foot plan off

846
00:52:23,940 --> 00:52:25,380
to the side, and then kind of rolled in.

847
00:52:25,780 --> 00:52:28,860
Went up a little higher, a little
higher, a little higher. As we got to

848
00:52:28,860 --> 00:52:33,420
the top, Beetle was the first one on
top, and he was actually the first one

849
00:52:33,420 --> 00:52:38,700
to roll in to actually from very top to
very bottom. Being that BMX wasn't my

850
00:52:38,700 --> 00:52:45,160
background, skateboarding was, it made
it a lot easier to drop in because that

851
00:52:45,160 --> 00:52:47,400
was skateboarding, you know, dropping
and whatnot.

852
00:52:48,170 --> 00:52:51,850
So when he worked to the bottom, gosh, I
wanted him to go 5 feet up, 10 feet up,

853
00:52:51,870 --> 00:52:55,690
15 feet. And next thing you know, I was
already to the top. The trip was going

854
00:52:55,690 --> 00:53:01,270
to be cut short if, you know, it didn't
happen to do it that day. My dad at the

855
00:53:01,270 --> 00:53:03,590
time was saying, you know, either go
home or make this movie.

856
00:53:03,890 --> 00:53:06,890
And finally did it after about an hour
and a half.

857
00:53:07,230 --> 00:53:11,330
Well, after he did it, being the
youngest guy out there, the rest of the

858
00:53:11,330 --> 00:53:14,450
guys had to go for it, you know. And
from there on, it was no problem.

859
00:53:21,040 --> 00:53:27,880
A cult classic is a movie that can be
viewed and is viewed by a particular

860
00:53:27,880 --> 00:53:31,580
segment of the population again and
again and again.

861
00:53:31,800 --> 00:53:35,360
I think it's years after its initial
viewing.

862
00:53:35,950 --> 00:53:39,330
still inspires people, still remember,
and still moves people, inspires people,

863
00:53:39,490 --> 00:53:43,510
and they remember it fondly when they
rediscover it. They didn't have to be

864
00:53:43,510 --> 00:53:46,310
popular movies, just movies that found
their audience.

865
00:53:46,750 --> 00:53:49,070
Then they're watching, well, that's a
cult classic. Or they remember lines,

866
00:53:49,230 --> 00:53:50,950
like ass-butting, or they remember that
song.

867
00:53:51,410 --> 00:53:52,990
Words that you still remember.

868
00:53:53,370 --> 00:54:00,070
What makes Rad a cult classic is the
fact that a lot of kids took

869
00:54:00,070 --> 00:54:03,710
that VHS tape and watched it over.

870
00:54:04,270 --> 00:54:08,890
And over and over and over and over
again. I know that no matter where I go,

871
00:54:09,010 --> 00:54:12,270
I'm associated with a movie and people
want to ask me about it. So it's got to

872
00:54:12,270 --> 00:54:13,270
be a cult classic.

873
00:54:13,690 --> 00:54:17,970
People watch it religiously over and
over and over again. They learn the

874
00:54:17,970 --> 00:54:18,970
words, they learn the songs.

875
00:54:19,210 --> 00:54:23,010
At that time, they didn't have DVDs. You
had to buy a videotape.

876
00:54:24,370 --> 00:54:28,610
Bicycle shops all over the United States
and I don't know, maybe Canada and the

877
00:54:28,610 --> 00:54:30,670
world and everything else were selling.

878
00:54:31,130 --> 00:54:34,990
tapes in their bicycle shops that's the
interesting thing about rad and i think

879
00:54:34,990 --> 00:54:39,030
that's one of the things that's turned
it into a bit of a cult classic is that

880
00:54:39,030 --> 00:54:44,490
the kids loved it and they wanted it and
they figured out a way to get it through

881
00:54:44,490 --> 00:54:50,150
blockbuster video and rentals and stuff
i think that's where the studio probably

882
00:54:50,150 --> 00:54:55,690
made most of their money and then it
started to catch on and then The tapes

883
00:54:55,690 --> 00:55:00,110
and things started really going out the
door. And it built that reputation.

884
00:55:00,730 --> 00:55:03,010
And from there on, it just kept growing.

885
00:55:03,250 --> 00:55:04,870
I can't believe the color classic.

886
00:55:05,070 --> 00:55:07,370
I mean, I think we're just proud that
people...

887
00:55:07,740 --> 00:55:11,040
still remember and still are inspired,
still remember the movie. I'm always

888
00:55:11,040 --> 00:55:14,600
honored and I'm always humbled by the
interest in this. I think it's great

889
00:55:14,600 --> 00:55:18,980
it's a cult classic. I have no problem
accepting it. People keep asking me this

890
00:55:18,980 --> 00:55:22,660
question. To be a cult classic means you
have to be old to begin with. Well, you

891
00:55:22,660 --> 00:55:25,400
are. So I don't believe it. I'm not
going to give in to that question. I'm

892
00:55:25,400 --> 00:55:27,380
not ready to hang above it. Well, you
always say you're old.

893
00:55:27,660 --> 00:55:31,180
People think it's that, and it's
inspired people, and they remember it,

894
00:55:31,220 --> 00:55:34,080
and they want to think it's a classic,
and it makes you feel great. We're

895
00:55:34,080 --> 00:55:37,560
making a movie about a bunch of guys on
bikes who do spins and dance on bikes.

896
00:55:37,720 --> 00:55:39,220
People thought we were from Mars.

897
00:55:39,460 --> 00:55:41,860
Forget about it. Yeah, I remember. It
was a very sort of... Classic. I mean,

898
00:55:41,900 --> 00:55:43,260
you know, what are you talking about?

899
00:55:43,540 --> 00:55:48,880
People think it's a cult classic, and I
agree with it, because look what it's

900
00:55:48,880 --> 00:55:49,880
done to...

901
00:55:49,980 --> 00:55:56,720
bmx and and to the fans you find a rad
fan they're a fan i had a guy come in

902
00:55:56,720 --> 00:56:00,920
the other day in my office from dhl he
was delivering a package and he saw a

903
00:56:00,920 --> 00:56:06,620
poster of rad and he almost fell over
he's like 45 years old dhl delivery guy

904
00:56:06,620 --> 00:56:10,940
and he said i can sing every word in
every song i know every line in that

905
00:56:10,940 --> 00:56:14,760
movie i can't believe i'm meeting you
and i don't think he knew i was ever a

906
00:56:14,760 --> 00:56:19,570
gymnast he just connected with me with
rad i think it's become a classic and i

907
00:56:19,570 --> 00:56:23,770
i think i've done two movies that become
a classic i think smoky and the bandit

908
00:56:23,770 --> 00:56:28,230
has become a classic so uh the 10 i've
done i've had two classics out of it

909
00:56:28,230 --> 00:56:33,370
that ain't all bad well i think the
thing that makes rad watchable over and

910
00:56:33,370 --> 00:56:39,060
over again is The kind of G-rated nature
of it, the kind of Frankie and Annette

911
00:56:39,060 --> 00:56:44,140
innocence that it portrays, and then
it's interspersed with all this amazing

912
00:56:44,140 --> 00:56:48,260
action. Perrin liked it. It was kind of
clean cut. It had to be a little edgy at

913
00:56:48,260 --> 00:56:51,480
the time, because you had the word hell
and hell track, or you had the little

914
00:56:51,480 --> 00:56:52,520
girl say what she said.

915
00:56:53,120 --> 00:56:54,120
Shit. Yeah.

916
00:56:54,540 --> 00:56:55,540
Oh, shit.

917
00:56:56,140 --> 00:56:57,320
Well, you little shit.

918
00:56:57,820 --> 00:56:58,920
Oh, shit.

919
00:56:59,740 --> 00:57:03,120
That is bullshit. No shit.

920
00:57:05,180 --> 00:57:09,460
Young kids liked it. The older kids
liked it. The hardcore BMXers may or may

921
00:57:09,460 --> 00:57:13,880
not have liked it, but they're thankful
that it represented BMX. Every kid looks

922
00:57:13,880 --> 00:57:17,480
back on that point in their life, that
time in their life, when we were just

923
00:57:17,480 --> 00:57:22,180
enjoying life to the fullest, just out
on our BMX bike, riding the trails or

924
00:57:22,180 --> 00:57:23,180
hitting the jumps.

925
00:57:23,320 --> 00:57:25,660
That's the part of life we look back and
we cherish.

926
00:57:25,900 --> 00:57:27,120
It could be for anybody.

927
00:57:27,700 --> 00:57:31,700
You know, everyone has it through in
them. The fans wouldn't let this movie

928
00:57:31,700 --> 00:57:34,080
go. To me, that's what made it.

929
00:57:34,870 --> 00:57:40,190
magical. The kids wanted it. Now, it may
not have made a lot of sense in the big

930
00:57:40,190 --> 00:57:47,010
dollar Hollywood box office accounting,
but it connected with kids.

931
00:57:47,190 --> 00:57:50,470
These were just kids with bikes hopping
curbs, and all of a sudden there was a

932
00:57:50,470 --> 00:57:51,470
movie for them.

933
00:57:51,810 --> 00:57:55,310
And to me, it was the fans that make it
a cult classic.

934
00:57:55,530 --> 00:57:59,290
It's a great story. It's not just
similar to what most of us probably did

935
00:57:59,290 --> 00:58:00,238
in our own way.

936
00:58:00,240 --> 00:58:04,000
There's a lot of great action footage
out there, but as every director knows,

937
00:58:04,100 --> 00:58:07,200
if you don't have an emotional
connection to the characters, it's not

938
00:58:07,200 --> 00:58:12,100
going to mean that much. So they were
able to create these characters that

939
00:58:12,100 --> 00:58:15,580
people related to that were able to do
these extraordinary things.

940
00:58:15,840 --> 00:58:20,120
And it's what the film is asking you to
do, whether your passion is BMX or

941
00:58:20,120 --> 00:58:24,980
piloting or writing for a living, is
find that passion.

942
00:58:25,480 --> 00:58:29,800
And then stick with it no matter what.
And I'm telling you, this message rings

943
00:58:29,800 --> 00:58:36,560
through the ages. And I get email on a
daily basis saying what that movie

944
00:58:36,560 --> 00:58:39,460
has meant to people for that reason.

945
00:58:39,950 --> 00:58:43,110
How often does it come into my day?
Well, you know, every day. I try to

946
00:58:43,110 --> 00:58:46,290
start my morning, I watch a few minutes.
You know, I always go to the

947
00:58:46,290 --> 00:58:50,110
introduction part, you know, with me.
But it'll come up in conversations about

948
00:58:50,110 --> 00:58:55,350
BMX, or as soon as they hear the name
Hollywood, they know. Hollywood McMoran

949
00:58:55,350 --> 00:58:58,070
from the movie Rad happens all the time,
publicly.

950
00:58:58,550 --> 00:59:04,070
I get messages on Facebook and Twitter
sometimes. Not a week goes by where

951
00:59:04,070 --> 00:59:06,910
somebody doesn't run up to me and say
something about Rad.

952
00:59:07,340 --> 00:59:13,180
I'm a musician. I do other acting jobs.
But this thing is something that has

953
00:59:13,180 --> 00:59:14,380
really taken a hold.

954
00:59:14,720 --> 00:59:20,640
And I don't think I would be doing
myself or the sport a service if I

955
00:59:20,640 --> 00:59:22,280
didn't pay attention to that.

956
00:59:22,600 --> 00:59:26,620
Because the story is classic. And that's
why Paper Route is so great. Because all

957
00:59:26,620 --> 00:59:27,900
the kids were running Paper Routes.

958
00:59:28,200 --> 00:59:30,940
or want to go out and have freedom. You
want your bike and you want to jump over

959
00:59:30,940 --> 00:59:34,040
that fence and you want to do these
things to show your freedom and show

960
00:59:34,040 --> 00:59:38,360
your guts. There's a simplicity to it.
And that doesn't change because, you

961
00:59:38,360 --> 00:59:40,300
know, that's the roots it has.

962
00:59:41,040 --> 00:59:44,460
It's a very well-loved movie. We went
and saw it when it was released. It was

963
00:59:44,460 --> 00:59:46,440
only in the theaters for a week, maybe
two weeks.

964
00:59:47,180 --> 00:59:51,000
Officially, it was somewhat of a flub.
It didn't make it well in the theaters

965
00:59:51,000 --> 00:59:54,680
originally. But the fan base has just
grown exponentially through the

966
00:59:54,680 --> 00:59:59,640
Internet. It's got legs, and I'm not
sure I ever anticipated that. You know,

967
00:59:59,680 --> 01:00:04,240
the movie lasted about a minute and a
half in the theaters, and yet here we

968
01:00:04,240 --> 01:00:07,620
are now over 30 years later still
talking about rad. It's kind of crazy.

969
01:00:08,000 --> 01:00:11,900
Well, a lot of these kids now that are
being introduced to the movie are second

970
01:00:11,900 --> 01:00:16,100
- or third-generation BMXers, so their
dads are saying...

971
01:00:16,640 --> 01:00:20,060
As dads will do, this is the movie you
need to see because it was important to

972
01:00:20,060 --> 01:00:23,160
me, so I think we're getting a lot of
fans that way.

973
01:00:23,440 --> 01:00:27,560
They're learning about it from their
fathers, and so they're educating these

974
01:00:27,560 --> 01:00:33,040
kids of where the history of BMX really
came from. The movie Rad is important

975
01:00:33,040 --> 01:00:36,660
because it captures that part of our
lives when we were young and innocent.

976
01:00:37,690 --> 01:00:40,210
Our greatest joy in life was riding our
bike.

977
01:00:40,470 --> 01:00:43,850
I think that the reason they love the
movie the way they do, the way they've

978
01:00:43,850 --> 01:00:47,030
latched onto it, is because they love
BMX.

979
01:00:47,290 --> 01:00:50,070
And if you love BMX, Rad is your movie.

980
01:00:50,330 --> 01:00:54,830
I can't really explain why it still
matters, but it does.

981
01:00:55,750 --> 01:00:59,910
And to me, that's really powerful,
because it connected with these young

982
01:00:59,910 --> 01:01:02,670
men and these young women at a very
impressionable age.

983
01:01:03,430 --> 01:01:05,650
And it's part of their youth.

984
01:01:06,400 --> 01:01:10,320
And they want to stay connected to that.
Get them on a bike, it'll keep them from

985
01:01:10,320 --> 01:01:13,240
having a gun in their hand, robbing
stores, smoking dope.

986
01:01:13,440 --> 01:01:16,920
I mean, it's kind of the only BMX movie
that's ever really been out there.

987
01:01:16,960 --> 01:01:20,880
There's the BMX Bandits, but that wasn't
really BMX. This was actually about

988
01:01:20,880 --> 01:01:23,300
racing and, you know, a local kid.

989
01:01:23,950 --> 01:01:27,950
Coming out of nowhere to race the big
guys, the big factory riders, you know,

990
01:01:27,970 --> 01:01:31,230
all the kids that saw it think, okay,
maybe I can do that. It showed that

991
01:01:31,230 --> 01:01:34,550
sometimes it was going to be hard, but
you could do it. You could get past

992
01:01:34,550 --> 01:01:37,590
whatever those struggles were just to
get out and ride your bike. And if it

993
01:01:37,590 --> 01:01:42,470
was racing like it was for me, you know,
I had to overcome obstacles myself to be

994
01:01:42,470 --> 01:01:43,470
able to race.

995
01:01:43,550 --> 01:01:48,410
And I think if it connects to me that
way, I'm sure it connects to a lot of

996
01:01:48,410 --> 01:01:49,259
kids too.

997
01:01:49,260 --> 01:01:54,040
I've talked to Tony Hawk and guys like
that who are icons in the extreme sports

998
01:01:54,040 --> 01:01:58,560
world, and a lot of them point to Rad as
being sort of the seminal moment for

999
01:01:58,560 --> 01:02:01,020
extreme sports.

1000
01:02:01,700 --> 01:02:08,660
And I think it deserves the credit, and
I think that goes back once again to Hal

1001
01:02:08,660 --> 01:02:12,620
Needham. He didn't want an average
track. He wanted something so outrageous

1002
01:02:12,620 --> 01:02:14,140
that your jaw would drop.

1003
01:02:15,580 --> 01:02:19,400
It's unrealistic to think that somebody
could ride this track. He set it up, and

1004
01:02:19,400 --> 01:02:25,840
the pro stepped up and did it. It took
Eddie Fiola and Martin and Pat Romano,

1005
01:02:25,980 --> 01:02:30,380
and it's like they were standing around
in their lab coats, you know, figuring

1006
01:02:30,380 --> 01:02:35,980
out these tricks and how to perfectly
execute them. Before Rad, we had one

1007
01:02:35,980 --> 01:02:40,920
drywaller in Arizona who could hit a
backflip, and now we got a guy doing

1008
01:02:40,920 --> 01:02:42,440
triple backflips.

1009
01:02:42,800 --> 01:02:46,720
I think stream sports is not going to go
away. It's going to get better and

1010
01:02:46,720 --> 01:02:52,100
better. And I think as long as people
remember and always be looking back and

1011
01:02:52,100 --> 01:02:54,080
finding the roots of these things, then
Red will be around.