'Days of Thunder' back story

[bullettoothtony]

Gents, this is a must-read.

https://www.espn.com/racing/nascar/s...e-days-thunder

[CameronBornAndBred]

Did the Duke basketball team show up in the movie? (I've never seen it.)
I'm guessing they did for it to be in this forum.

[OZZIE4DUKE]

Did the Duke basketball team show up in the movie? (I've never seen it.)
I'm guessing they did for it to be in this forum.

Probably not for long!

[bullettoothtony]

Did the Duke basketball team show up in the movie? (I've never seen it.)
I'm guessing they did for it to be in this forum.

It would've won an Oscar if they had.

Cary Elwes' part should've gone to Christian Laettner.

Or Bobby Hurley.

[ClosetHurleyFan]

Yes. That is fantastic. Hey thanks for sharing.

[bullettoothtony]

Yes. That is fantastic. Hey thanks for sharing.

Glad to do it.

There really are some great stories in that article. Rick Hendrick, Paul Newman and Tom Cruise bonding over race cars?

Also, I had no idea so many of the scenes in that movie were based on actual events.

[bundabergdevil]

I thought Days of Thunder was about Patrick Davidson’s time at Duke.

Days of Thunder and Caligula Nights, right?

[Crisker]

Gents, this is a must-read.

https://www.espn.com/racing/nascar/s...e-days-thunder

I've never seen "Days of Thunder" and don't watch or care about Nascar.

Given these facts, what am I missing and why is this must-read?

Thanks in advance and Cliff's appreciated!

[cspan37421]

Seems like wrong forum to me.

[bullettoothtony]

I've never seen "Days of Thunder" and don't watch or care about Nascar.

Given these facts, what am I missing and why is this must-read?

Thanks in advance and Cliff's appreciated!

Given that it is of course the 2nd greatest movie ever--behind Road House--I assumed everyone had seen it and would enjoy learning a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff.

;-)

[Billy Dat]

Given that it is of course the 2nd greatest movie ever--behind Road House--I assumed everyone had seen it and would enjoy learning a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff.

;-)

Thanks for the link. I really like the movie (peak Cruise being Cruise). The thread probably does belong in the "Off-Topic" section as there are no ties to Duke Basketball.

A couple of items stood out:

-Don Simpson, the producer, was a legendary party animal. I have read a lot about Hollywood from the late 60s to the 90s and he is the source and the subject of many tawdry tales. It sounds like the combination of he, Tony Scott and Jerry Bruckheimer, plus a basically unlimited budget, amped it all up to eleven. The story about them cutting holes in their adjoining hotel suites so that they wouldn't have to use the hallway to travel between each other's rooms seems like apocryphal, but it wouldn't be the first time that some drug-fueled entertainers took some liberties with the walls between their adjoining hotel rooms (https://archive.org/post/323652/jerr...th-moon-in-nyc)

-The NASCAR guys did not like that Robert Duvall's Harry was building his car in some rural barn. They felt it gave fuel to the southern hayseed stereotype when, in truth, their cars were built in extremely high tech settings.

-The spent weeks filming crashes all day long and then would ship the cars back to Hendricks Motor Sports where the team was on call 24/7 to rebuild them for the next day's shoot.

-Cruise nearly had 2 dozen devoutly religious NASCAR drivers ready to convert to Scientology when they stumbled upon him kissing a photo of L. Ron Hubbard and got weirded out

One of these items is a lie.

[arnie]

Given that it is of course the 2nd greatest movie ever--behind Road House--I assumed everyone had seen it and would enjoy learning a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff.

;-)

3rd best ever - Caddyshack easily wins.