The action comedy The Fall Guy has the honor of kicking off the 2024 summer blockbuster season. Loosely based on the 1980s TV series about stunt performers, it stars Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt and is directed by David Leitch, who has previously thrilled audiences with Atomic Blonde, Deadpool 2, and Bullet Train.
The film’s pedigree, both in front of and behind the camera, the iconic IP, and the fact that audiences continue to return to theaters en masse to experience movies set The Fall Guy up for success. Those factors, coupled with a cocktail of inspirations and dynamite chemistry between the leads, make the movie almost impossible to resist.
“The chemistry between Ryan and Emily is the glue holding the tone together. I needed their relationship to feel real, charming, messy, and authentic. It’s the heartbeat,” Leitch enthused. “It’s unique that we have such a beautiful, clumsy love story in the middle of this crazy, bombastic action movie. That was really exciting when I got into post-production and saw it all coming together. I felt like we had something fresh and original.”
“Because their chemistry was so good, I was hanging the film on it and ensuring every scene we chewed it up and stayed with it. When I saw it in real-time early on, I was like, ‘How much of them can I get on screen together and hang this movie on them? Because this is remarkable.'”
The Fall Guy, which is in theaters now, is about down-and-out stuntman Gosling’s Colt Seavers, who is called back into action and must find the missing star of the blockbuster film, which happens to be his ex-girlfriend Jody’s blockbuster directorial debut. Emily Blunt plays Jody.
Gosling and Blunt’s crackling interplay echoes Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd in Moonlighting and Robert De Niro and Charles Grodin in Midnight Run, which were inspirations in addition to the original The Fall Guy TV show. However, there were also others.
“F/X: Murder By Illusion was part of it and how the crew comes together with all this movie magic and going to thwart the bad guys,” Leitch explained. “That was one hundred percent one of the influences. I think Grosse Pointe Blank was probably the biggest influence on the relationship part of the movie. I felt like that movie was the tone we wanted for their relationship. Colt’s coming back; he’s got to pay his dues, but you see them immediately; they’re undeniable and have to be together, but she’s not going to let him in that quickly. He’s got a certain set of skills, he’s a self-deprecating guy, so there’s a lot of a John Cusack and Minnie Driver in Colt and Jody.”
Outside of the eyepopping action, one of The Fall Guy‘s biggest selling points is the verbal sparring between Gosling and Blunt. Some of that was on the page, but not all of it, and balance was key.
“The fact that it works so well is a testament to them. There are some great words on the page from Drew Pearce, Ryan, and myself who contributed to that script, but it’s a lot of bettering the scenes on the day and finding the real moments,” the director said. “They’re both such great and giving actors, and they want each other to win, allowing for the best scene. A lot of times, you are in a scene, and there’s competition. That can be good for a movie, but for The Fall Guy, we didn’t care who won; it was more about who needed to win this scene. How do we give that character the win so the audience wins? That was the attitude we had in the whole film.”
The action star of Jody’s movie within the movie is Tom Ryder, played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson. Gosling’s Seavers is his stunt double; in character, they look uncannily alike. Even Leitch was surprised.
“You had to have that, and it’s hard to do. It isn’t until you get them close and next to each other that you are really going to know,” Leitch, a former stuntman, recalled. “I had thoughts that Aaron might not be perfect, but then when we got him here, colored his hair just right, and he started to put on the persona, you’re like, ‘Oh my god, they could be brothers right now. This is the perfect casting.’ Sometimes, you don’t look like the actor you are doubling for. I doubled Brad Pitt, and I don’t look anything like him, but what a blessing to have Aaron in this and bring that character to life.”
“It was so fun to reconnect with him after we worked together on Bullet Train. I love working with Aaron because he is fearless, has bold ideas, and is inspired. No lie, I did drag him kicking and screaming. I don’t think anyone signs up to play like a neurotic narcissist like that, but I’m like, ‘Dude, he’s heightened, he’s the foil, let’s just have fun, and you can make him as big as you want.’ I finally convinced him, and we had so much fun building that character together, and he makes it so watchable.”
Although much of The Fall Guy is about the epic set pieces on screen, elevated even further by Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos’ premium, immersive sound, Leitch wanted to play with details and use them to enhance the storytelling. Sometimes, that involved the rest of the crew, such as with the Post-it notes that festoon Ryder’s apartment.
“We were having fun and using the crew to write jokes because you had to cover so much wall space at any given time. We had notepads on set so you could create your own stuff, put it up, then we’d curate them as we got closer to camera,” the filmmaker enthused. “You had to develop the Tom Ryder character so that he haunted the movie, and you wanted to get insight into who he was. I thought it was a clever way to get insights into his mad brain by seeing little snippets of what he writes on notes. As we came up with that character trait, it became the way that we discovered the clue that we needed to discover the twist. I loved it.”
Another example was having Gosling’s Seavers wear a Miami Vice Stunt Show jacket, which has excited theme park fans.
“Ryan loves jackets, and we were looking for something that could be Colt’s signature look. Costume designer Sarah Evelyn and Mark Avery, the stylist for Ryan, were sifting through jackets and came across this vintage Miami Vice Stunt Show jacket. It was the live show that used to be at Universal Studios Hollywood,” Leitch explained. “Ryan was like, ‘I love this.’ They bought it, and we got it here, but it was the wrong size, so they recreated it. I love plant payoffs, so I was like, ‘This has to be a reason why you’re wearing it, and there has to be a whole story behind it,’ so we put into the script that he used to work on the stunt show, and he could do the thing with hands behind his back so I tell the stunt team and we work it into the movie.”
“It’s so fun when one department comes up with this thing, and then I take it and extrapolate it throughout the rest of the scripts. It drives everybody else nuts, but it’s my favorite part of making a movie. It’s just an organic process. None of that was in the script. He’s building his costume. And it has such an important part of the movie now.”
To coincide with The Fall Guy landing in theaters, Universal Studios Hollywood has launched the The Fall Guy Stuntacular Pre-Show, a stunt show inspired by the movie. Through Sunday, May 19, 2024, it happens before the popular WaterWorld live show in the same space previously occupied by the Miami Vice Stunt Show.
“It is actually the perfect IP for a live show,” Leitch said. Could it lead to a permanent attraction at Universal Studios Hollywood or other Universal Parks? A The Fall Guy-themed replacement for Fast and Furious: Supercharged on the Studio Tour could work.
“I would think that their wheels are turning. Let’s see how the movie does and if people love it, but it makes so much sense,” he responded.
As much as it is a love letter to the stunt community, The Fall Guy is also a love letter to movies, with references to everything from Pretty Woman to The Fast and The Furious. Characters even quote classic dialogue, which created something of a logistical headache.
“Some of it was easy, but others were hard. It depends on how you use it, and I drove the clearance people nuts every day because we were improving different things. It depends on where the library is. Obviously, Universal movies were easier to clear, and some were harder, but it’s fun and gives the clearance department something to do,” Leitch laughed.
“We had already established that Colt and Dan, Winston Duke’s character, really loved movies, and they had all these quotes and everything. That was sort of established, and we were mining all of that fun stuff. When we started in the fight scene in Ryder’s apartment, Winston came up with the idea that he would shout out his favorite action star moves and movies, which is why we have things like Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson and Jason Bourne. That was total improv.”
Although The Fall Guy was predominantly filmed in and around Sydney, Australia, a Los Angeles landmark, the El Coyote restaurant on Beverly Boulevard gets some brief love and a new name in a scene where Gosling’s Seavers has a job as a valet.
“Yes, that’s El Coyote or El Cockatoo del Capitan, as we call it,” Leitch laughed. “It was just a little nod to Hollywood and feeling the LA texture and vibe. It felt like a perfect place for Colt to park cars.”
