Arnold Schwarzenegger Talked James Cameron Into Making Him the Terminator

The big picture

• says Arnold Schwarzenegger
  The Terminator
  it almost starred OJ Simpson as the eponymous cyborg sent from the future.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger convinced Cameron to be the Terminator by emphasizing the importance of acting like a machine.
• There are conflicting accounts between Schwarzenegger and Cameron as to whether Simpson was seriously considered for the role. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.

It's hard to believe, but roughly forty years have passed since then James Cameron changed movies forever with the release of The Terminator in 1984. At just 30 years old, this was Cameron's breakthrough, with his only other low-budget feature. Piranha II: The Generation in 1981. His story about a cyborg sent from the future to kill the mother of a future leader of the resistance against the robots that have taken over Earth set Cameron on the path to becoming a of the most influential filmmakers in history. Before that could happen, however, Cameron needed to find the perfect face for his robotic monster. As we all know, the paper was Arnold Schwarzenegger, sending his career into the stratosphere, but there was earlier talk of another famous name playing the role. Then a conversation with James Cameron changed everything, shaping the story as we know it now.

Arnold Schwarzenegger says OJ Simpson was the first choice

In 1984, James Cameron may not have been famous yet, but Arnold Schwarzenegger was. He was the largest-than-life Austrian bodybuilder who had won seven Mr. Bodybuilding titles. Olympias and four Mr. Universe before moving on to acting with roles in movies like Now Conan the Barbarian in 1982. Two years later, the same year a Conan the Barbarian sequel, conan the destroyer, was released, Arnold met with the untested Cameron about his next project, a film with a much larger scope than Killer Fish.

In a 2022 interview with Graham Bensinger, Schwarzenegger went into great detail about what those early interactions with James Cameron were like. Arnold said that when he became involved with the film, OJ Simpsonthen a beloved retired NFL running back who had moved on to acting, was supposed to be the Terminator, with Schwarzenegger playing Kyle Reese, the good guy who protects Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) and fight the Terminator. The paper would eventually go to Michael Biehn. Arnold was told that he would meet Cameron for lunch, because Cameron had to sign him as Reese.

Arnold Schwarzenegger convinced James Cameron to give him the role of Terminator

During the lunch, Schwarzenegger told Cameron his thoughts on the film and focused on the Terminator, who he was not cast to play. He raised Yul Brennerkiller robotic performance of Westworld, saying “It was all a little off because it wasn't like a human, there was something wrong here, but you couldn't pinpoint exactly what it was.” Arnold was fascinated by Brenner's mechanical movements and told Cameron whoever played Terminator had to be trained to act like a machine. “He can't go and look down and put the magazine in the gun. . . . This has to be done like a machine, so it has to be trained blindfolded.”

Schwarzenegger said Cameron was impressed by his opinion and totally agree. Then, at that point, he said to Arnold, “There's nobody who understands the Terminator better than you, so I think we can all agree that you should play the Terminator.” To this, Arnold said no. He saw playing the Terminator, who barely had any lines, as a regression in his acting career. I wanted to be Reese, who had all the lines and was more of a challenge. Cameron would not be so easily deterred. He told Arnold, “Trust me, I'm going to shoot the character so you're not just the number one villain they've ever seen, but the number one hero.” Cameron told Schwarzenegger to go home and think about it for a few days. He did just that, going back and forth between portraying himself as the hero and the villain. “Finally one day I woke up and said, you know, he's right. He'd be the most memorable character if he played it right.”

According to James Cameron, OJ Simpson was never a serious choice

This interview isn't the only time Schwarzenegger has brought up that OJ Simpson was the first choice to be the Terminator. He has also appeared in other interviews, including in 2019 with The Independent. “It was actually OJ Simpson who was the first Terminator cast. Then in a way [James Cameron] he felt he wasn't that believable for a killing machine. Then they hired me. That's really what happened.” Schwarzenegger continued that he had real evidence of this, saying, “In the painting I have at home, it was painted by Jim Cameron. Underneath my face is actually OJ Simpson's face. He was already painted, with his leather jacket and gun in his hand. I have the painting in my office. So if someone scrapes the part of my face, there's going to be OJ underneath”

With such a shocking revelation, of course, someone should ask James Cameron if it was true that Simpson was the first choice for what would become such an iconic character. In 2019, in an interview with The Los Angeles TimesCameron said bluntly: “Arnold is literally wrong.” Cameron said he was the head of Orion, Mike Medaway, who called Cameron and pitched the idea of ​​OJ Simpson as the Terminator and Arnold Schwarzenegger as Kyle Reese. “[Producer and co-screenwriter] Gale Hurd and I looked at me like it was the stupidest thing we'd ever heard in our lives,” Cameron said. “And I told him on that phone call, 'It's no OJ Simpson. We're not doing that. And he said, “Well, are you going to meet Arnold Schwarzenegger?”

Cameron talked about meeting Arnold at that fateful lunch and how the idea of ​​him playing Reese didn't make a lot of sense because he wasn't a very articulate guy. As Schwarzenegger continued to talk about the Terminator character, Cameron thought, “He'd make a really good Terminator. He'd be a human bulldozer!” And as for Arnold's Terminator painting? Cameron said it was a present for Arnold. after the movie and that no OJ Simpson underneath.

Who knows who is telling the truth here? It's probably somewhere in between Schwarzenegger and Cameron's memories. Arnold may be beefing up (pun intended) the film's backstory for attention, or Cameron could be trying to downplay Simpson's role for what would happen in OJ's life later. If the man who almost starred in your first big movie later became famous for the crime of the century, would you want to go around talking about how you almost hired him? We would celebrate The Terminator and its sequel with someone as controversial as its star, or would we brush it aside as something to be ashamed of and forget about? And what would have become of Arnold Schwarzenegger if instead he had been hurt like Kyle Reese? Would the action rush that dominated the next decade ever happen? Luckily, we'll never know.

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