Arrive Alive

Arrive Alive is an unfinished comedy film directed by Jeremiah S. Chechik and starring Willem Dafoe and Joan Cusack. It was produced by Art Linson.

This article is about the 1980s comedy film. For other uses, see Arrive Alive (disambiguation).
Arrive Alive
Directed byJeremiah S. Chechik
Produced byArt Linson
Written byMichael O'Donoghue
Mitch Glazer
StarringWillem Dafoe
Joan Cusack
Release date
1991 (intended)
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Premise

Mickey Crews is a house detective in a seedy Florida hotel who gets involved in investigating the death of a former champion boxer. He has a romance with a former exotic dancer named Joy.

Background

The script was written by Mitch Glazer and Michael O'Donoghue who had written Scrooged (1988) for producer Art Linson. Linson had tried to get Arrive Alive made for a number of years, with a variety of stars attached, before finally securing funding with Chechik, Dafoe and Cusack. Cusack was an up-and-coming actress, working on Saturday Night Live, Dafoe was getting terrific buzz from The Last Temptation of Christ and Chechik had just directed the successful National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.[1]

Filming started in April 1990.[2] However, after a week, the producers felt that the lines they had thought so funny in the script were not getting the laughs they hoped for. Shortly after arriving for location shooting in Miami, Dafoe quit due to script changes which required him to perform slapstick comedy which did not suit him.[3] Six days later, the decision was taken to cancel production as no satisfactory replacement could be found for Dafoe[3] and write off the $7 million cost. The whole story is related in Linson's book A Pound of Flesh.[4]

Various attempts have been made to film the script again without any success.[5]

The killer whale Lolita was to appear in the film but production was halted while filming at the Miami Seaquarium.[5]

References
  1. Drew McWeeny, 'Saturday Night At The Movies: What exactly was 'Arrive Alive,' and what happened?', Hit Fix, 19 June 2011 accessed 14 April 2012
  2. 'Films Going Into Production', Los Angeles Times, 22 April 1990
  3. Tusher, Will (May 2, 1990). "Paramount shutters 'Arrive Alive' following departure of star Dafoe". Variety. p. 15.
  4. Art Linson, A Pound of Flesh: Perilous Tales of How to Produce Movies in Hollywood, Groves Press, 1998
  5. 'Mitch Glazer And Mr. Beaks Discuss The Vicissitudes Of PASSION PLAY (And A Forgotten Collaboration With Michael O'Donoghue)!', Aint-It-Cool-News, May 20, 2011
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