Actor Ralph Macchio has revealed among the many pitches he acquired to revive his Karate Kid character Daniel LaRusso, together with one thought that might have teamed him with Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky Balboa.
In an excerpt from his new memoir Waxing On: The Karate Kid and Me (shared by EW), Macchio appeared again in any respect the methods folks urged reviving his traditional character.
“I can’t begin to share all of the pitches and ideas I had heard over thirty years on how and why I should return to the LaRusso well,” the actor famous, detailing concepts that featured all the pieces from Mr. Miyagi as a ghost, to LaRusso elevating his drug-addicted teen son.
But Macchio’s favourite failed pitch got here when he was having lunch with some studio executives and director John Avildsen, who had helmed each The Karate Kid and Rocky. “I remember the enthusiasm with which the writer gave his ‘elevator pitch’ to John, me, and the studio execs,” Macchio recalled, earlier than paraphrasing the thought: “What if Rocky Balboa had a kid and Daniel-san had a kid and they were both f—ups and you, Ralph and Stallone, come together between New Jersey and Philadelphia to join in a Miyagi/Mickey style of fight training. People would go nuts!”
The pitch left Macchio shocked. “A pregnant pause. It seemed to last for ten minutes, though it was probably only four seconds.”
Shockingly, the actor sensed that the studio executives – considering extra about income than plot factors – may really be open to such an absurd thought. “My mind raced to gather visions of Stallone and me running through the slums of Newark,” he remembered considering.
It was at that time that Avildsen spoke up. “John burst into laughter, simply responding that it would not work and was a forced idea,” Macchio recalled. “I believe he diplomatically said he wasn’t interested in combining those two franchises or those characters.”
For greater than 30 years, Macchio declined alternatives to revisit LaRusso, admitting that he was “extremely protective” of the character. He ultimately returned to the position within the collection Cobra Kai, which launched in 2018 and has grow to be successful for Netflix. The present’s fifth season premiered in September.
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