Val Kilmer informed Matthew Modine that he was “tired of you getting all the jobs in town” & inadvertently knowledgeable him about Full Metal Jacket.
Matthew Modine starred in Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, but it surely was a task he might not have acquired had it not been for Val Kilmer. While you may suppose that this story includes Kilmer recommending Modine for the position or serving to him audition, it doesn’t. Instead, Kilmer was pissed that Modine was taking all of the roles and inadvertently informed him about Full Metal Jacket after assuming he had snagged that position as effectively.
“I was with the wonderful actor David Alan Grier at The Source on Hollywood Boulevard,” Modine informed THR. “So we had been sitting there having pancakes and discussing that, and only a few ft forward of me, somebody was me and clearly telling me, for simplicity, to go f*** myself. And I informed David, ‘Unless this guy’s bought Tourette’s or he’s an actor memorizing a monologue, he’s clearly telling me to go f*** myself.’ So David seemed over his shoulder and mentioned, ‘Oh, that’s Val Kilmer. He’s a very nice man.’“
Modine went over to introduce himself to Kilmer, however the actor was already effectively conscious of who Modine was. “I was on a run from Private School and Streamers to Vision Quest and Mrs. Soffel, and while Val could have easily been cast in those movies, he wasn’t,” Modine defined. “So he mentioned, ‘I’m sick of you. I’m bored with you getting all the roles on the town, and now you’re doing Full Metal Jacket.’ And I mentioned, ‘I’m not doing Full Metal Jacket.’ You needed to audition for it, which Val did. In his documentary, it exhibits how deep he went into the audition for that movie. So I mentioned, ‘I assure you, I’m not doing Full Metal Jacket as a result of I didn’t audition.’“
As quickly as Modine completed breakfast, he was on the telephone along with his supervisor. “I ran out to a payphone and put in a bunch of quarters to call my manager in New York. I said, ‘This actor just told me that I’m doing Kubrick’s movie Full Metal Jacket. Do you know anything about it?’ And he said, ‘I don’t know anything about it.’ So I said, ‘Well, I know that Kubrick makes his movies with Warner Bros., and we have Vision Quest there. So why don’t we call [Vision Quest director] Harold Becker and Warner Bros., and ask them to send a print to Stanley Kubrick so he can see it? I’ll also call Alan Parker in London to get him to send over some scenes [from Birdy’s edit].’” Modine acquired the script for Full Metal Jacket in his mail a month later, which included a word from Kubrick which mentioned: “Hello, my name is Stanley Kubrick. I’m a film director, and I wonder if you’d consider being in my film.” The relaxation, as they are saying, is historical past.