‘Gene Hackman was scary as hell. At the premiere, he pulled me aside and said: “I didn’t think you had a clue what you were doing!”’
My wife and I were about to take our first cruise and I needed a book. I hadn’t read any Elmore Leonard novels but Get Shorty was about Hollywood so I thought it’d be interesting. I bought it and loved it. A few years previously I had shot Throw Momma from the Train with Danny DeVito and I called him and he said: “I’ll buy it, you direct it and I’ll produce and star in it.” I saw Danny as Chili Palmer because, for me, the strength of Chili and the strength of Danny is self-confidence.
