10 Things You Didn’t Know About Skyscraper

Die Hard rip-offs may have been a dime a dozen in the 90’s but you could say that I was a bit surprised when the biggest movie star in the world signed on to do a film that might be the biggest Die Hard knockoff EVER! At the same time, I love the idea of knocking off one of the greatest action movies of all time and it’s good to see Dwayne Johnson doing something other than a sequel to a franchise he didn’t start. The least I could do to help support him was watch his movie three years after it came out and as a rental from the library, no less! I hope that my hours of watching the DVD features and director commentary has taught me a thing or two and now I’d like to deliver them to you in the form of 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Skyscraper.

1- The Pineapple dick pic story: Director Rawson Marshall Thurber came up with the very general idea for the movie and sent a text to Dwayne Johnson who he had just worked with on Central Intelligence. He told DJ to reply with a picture of himself holding a pineapple if he was in or a dick pic if he didn’t want to do the film. DJ said that he already had a similar project in the works and then waited several minutes before sending a pic of him flipping the bird holding a pineapple.

2- Inspiration: Real life amputee Jeff Glasbrenner was the inspiration for Dwayne’s character Will Sawyer. He’s the first American amputee to climb Mt. Everest, a multi-time Paralympian, and one hell of a motivational speaker.

3- Foot in the Door: Rawson Marshall Thurber admits that he had been auditioning to direct any number of superhero movies from Marvel and DC but didn’t seem to be getting many second looks since his background was all in comedy. I would guess that directing a $100+ million dollar movie with the biggest actor in the world is a decent second prize.

4- Started from the bottom: The opening scene with Dwayne Johnson getting blown up during the FBI raid was inspired by the opening scene of Cliffhanger with Sly Stallone. Thurber loved the idea that it begins with Sly’s character failing to save the woman and then trying to dig himself out of that hole for the entirety of the film.

5- Location, location, location: The movie was originally going to be set in Macau since Thurber considered it to be the “Las Vegas of Asia”. He visited and realized that it was more the “Reno of Asia” and decided to place the film in Hong Kong instead. It was mostly shot in Vancouver, though, so what does it really matter?

6- Two Brutes: The fight between Pablo and Dwayne was shot over the course of 5 days in a roughly 3 week period and all pieced together later. Pablo is 6’5″ so they really wanted the audience to feel that smallness of the room during the brawl.

7- Getting it Right: There was always the lingering knowledge that this movie would be in that Die Hard knockoff category but Thurber never wanted it to be compared to the classic. While John McClane was an underdog based on the odds against him, The Rock’s Will Sawyer has his past demons, his prosthetic leg, and a family full of innocents in a burning building to worry about.

8- I’m Behind You: Originally they had shot a different ending with Dwayne taking out the big baddie but then someone suggested using the mirrors and the “I’m behind you” gimmick. They went over it and thought that it seemed unique so they did a couple of days of pick-ups and reshoots to fit it in.

9- It Feels So Good: The reunited scene with Dwayne’s Will Sawyer and his family was also reshot on a Warner Brothers stage. The original ending was much less happy and seemed to send the movie off on a less fun and cheerful tone.

10- Yo Adrian: There was a lot of talk between DJ and Thurber about recreating the feeling at the end of Rocky in this film. That was how they eventually got to re-shooting the reuniting scene between DJ and his family in front of the crowd. Funnily enough, the final scene of Rocky was also a reshoot.