If you’re like me, you’ve seen Say Anything dozens of times and find ways to work Lloyd Dobler quotes into everyday life as much as possible. A long time ago, a friend of mine even asked if I’d ever stood outside of someone’s apartment with a boom box over my head. After explaining that doing something like that would probably be considered stalking in real life, I thought to myself, “That’s how iconic the boom box scene is for my generation.”
Reflecting on the scene, one would think that the famous moment – in which John Cusack's Lloyd plays “In Your Eyes” by Peter Gabriel – would have been a fairly straightforward shot, but it was quite the opposite, according to director Cameron Crowe.
John Cusack Really Didn’t Like The Idea Of The Scene
As it was written for the film , John Cusack didn’t think it was the right thing for Lloyd to do, as Crowe recently told the New York Times, saying
He felt like it was a subservient act: Why does Lloyd have to be a wuss like that? We struggled with how to get that scene. The legendary cinematographer Laszlo Kovacs knew that we’d been battling.
So, Crowe and Kovacs acquiesced and went in a different direction, at least at first. The Jerry Maguire filmmaker continued,
We had actually shot the scene where Cusack had the boom box on the hood of a car and he [Cusack] was saying, ‘That’s more what I would do.’
I’m actually with Cusack on this – or, at least, I can see where he was coming from. I do think that Lloyd, who is one part Gen X-slacker icon and one part love fool in the movie, probably would just sit solemnly outside Diane Court’s window with the boom box playing next to him.
But Kovacs seemingly knew that the shot wouldn’t work, as Crowe explained, and he made an effort to subvert it. Said the director,
Laszlo leaned over and whispered in my ear, ‘Don’t worry, there’s no film in the camera.’
I also don’t think, as others don’t, that Lloyd would be playing a Peter Gabriel song for Diane (Ione Skye). In fact, the original song choice was “To Be A Lover” by Billy Idol. I’ve always thought that another song on the Say Anything soundtrack, “Within Your Reach” by The Replacements, would have been perfect. However, even if I think it’s a little out of character for the slacker part of Lloyd, the shot in the movie is right in line with the love fool.
Here’s How They Actually Got The Famous Moment
At the end of the final day of filming for the most iconic scene in Say Anything, Cameron Crowe tried one more time to get the legendary shot, telling the NYT,
On the last day, as we were losing the sun, he said: ‘I found a place across the street that would be good, and the car is parked there. Let’s get him across the street and see if we can get it.’
Cusack gave in and agreed to try the shot, though he evidently wasn't very happy about. As it turns out, though, having the actor be disgruntled gave the character the pitch perfect emotional mode for the scene:
So we ran across the street. [John] said, ‘OK, I’ll do it.’ So he’s holding up the boom box, literally kind of pissed that he’s having to do it one more time. And you knew it watching in the monitor: That was the perfect emotion for the scene.
The perfect emotion, indeed. It’s a shot, not just a great music moment in a Cusack movie, but in film history, that will never be forgotten. It just goes to show that it’s never a bad idea to trust the vision of two legends like Cameron Crowe and Lazlo Kovacs.
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