So was Candy, and he was joined in the movie by fellow "SCTV" Canadians Dave Thomas and Joe Flaherty. Screenwriters Goldberg and Blum are Canadian. Reitman was born in Czechoslovakia but emigrated to Canada as a child. Why was one of the best-loved Army comedies made by a bunch of Canadians? Sure, it's true that the lead best friends John Winger and Russell Ziskey were played by Chicago natives Bill Murray and Harold Ramis, but they were totally surrounded by our friends from the North on set. "It just took away any kind of negativity from the movie, and that support really made it a very enjoyable experience for everybody because we were really embraced by the Army." 3. That support "made it really easy for us to get troops during filming," said screenwriter and producer Daniel Goldberg. And the Army's decision to support the production made all the difference. You have to wonder whether anyone at the Pentagon actually read the screenplay before giving the Army's blessing to "Stripes." Even though the movie followed the old Hollywood arc of "raw recruits surviving training before taking on the enemy on the field of battle," all the anarchy was in the details.Ī big part of the reason that "Stripes" works is that the movie was filmed in a real military environment. After they signed up John Candy to play wildman recruit Dewey "Ox" Oxberger, the pieces were in place for a truly chaotic comedy. Both "Cheech and Chong's Next Movie" and "Nice Dreams" were released before "Stripes," so they were never really going to show up and star in someone else's film.įortunately, Reitman got along with Bill Murray from "Meatballs" and recruited him to play the lead, John Winger. They were grinding the movies out quickly. Cheech and Chong were hot after the surprise success of "Up in Smoke" in 1978, but they were writing their own movies and Tommy Chong was the director (even though their manager Lou Adler somehow took credit for Chong's work on the first movie). My idea was to have Cheech and Chong join the Army that's what Dan and Lenny initially wrote." We were in peaceful times, it was post-Vietnam, and I thought it would be great to have some comedic look at the Army that would not be another protest movie. "I felt like it was time for another service comedy. "It was just before the premiere of Meatballs in Toronto, Canada," said Reitman in an interview with the U.S. Reitman came up with the idea for a pro- Army comedy about best friends joining together and enlisted screenwriters Len Blum and Daniel Goldberg to write the screenplay. Tommy Chong and Cheech Marin in their movie "Up in Smoke."
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