{"id":42544,"date":"2025-08-03T16:37:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-03T16:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/42544\/"},"modified":"2025-08-03T16:37:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-03T16:37:08","slug":"liam-neeson-did-not-attempt-naked-gun-leslie-nielsen-impression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/42544\/","title":{"rendered":"Liam Neeson Did Not Attempt ‘Naked Gun’ Leslie Nielsen Impression"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Naked Gun<\/a>,\u201d for most younger folk was \u2014\u00a0if anything \u2014\u00a0a movie series that ran a lot on cable during the \u201990s and \u201900s. But for Gen Xers and Boomers, it was the ultimate spoof franchise, starring the king of deadpan Leslie Nielsen<\/a>. But excitement has been building across all demographics for the this year\u2019s reboot (evidenced in the film<\/a>\u2018s youth-heavy opening weekend<\/a> numbers), as ad after ad has built upon action star Liam Neeson<\/a>\u2018s new, bumbling persona.<\/a> And, in turn, audiences have revisited the original \u201cNaked Gun\u201d trilogy in preparation (or at least, that\u2019s how things were going down with my Letterboxd follows).<\/p>\n

Neeson, however, is not to be counted among the rewatchers. In fact, the actor made a point of not revisiting the original films, which also starred Priscilla Presley (who you might just spot<\/a> in the new movie) \u2014\u00a0though he did see them when they originally hit cinema screens (\u201cThey were a good giggle, he said. \u201cFun. School boy humor\u201d).<\/p>\n

\"Tom<\/a> \"'The<\/a> <\/p>\n

\u201cI just trusted the script,\u201d Neeson told Variety<\/a>. \u201cAnd knew it would get better the more they worked on it. [Director Akiva Schaffer]<\/a> was the co-writer but there was always another writer on set \u2014 a friend of Akiva\u2019s, obviously \u2014 and they would supply alternate endings to scenes. \u2018Try this, try that.’\u201d<\/p>\n

As for whether or not he attempted to emulate Nielsen in his delivery, Neeson said, \u201cNo, those sort of notes I wouldn\u2019t have accepted. I\u2019ve done over 100 movies, so I don\u2019t need someone to tell me how to act.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neeson has indeed done over 100 movies \u2014\u00a0106 with \u201cNaked Gun\u201d to be exact \u2014 but he had never before done an out-and-out farce. On set, though, the \u201cTaken\u201d actor stuck to business as usual. \u201cWhen we rehearsed stuff, we\u2019d get rid of our personal giggles. And some of the scene require certain choreography \u2014 sight gags and stuff like that. I don\u2019t want to say it was always serious, far from it. But it was serious business, of course, shooting any movie and keeping a sense of lightness. You know, that\u2019s very important,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

Working with co-star Pamela Anderson<\/a> \u2014\u00a0whom he\u2019s now reportedly dating<\/a> \u2014 Neeson described as a wholly pleasant experience. \u201cI admire her very much\u2026 No airs and graces, no big ego. She\u2019s there to do the work. She\u2019s just a lovely human being,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Neeson is Nielsen\u2019s son in the new \u201cNaked Gun\u201d<\/a> timeline \u2014\u00a0an interesting choice considering the 72-year-old Neeson is roughly 40 years older than the son that was born to Nielsen and Presley\u2019s characters in \u201cThe Naked Gun 33 1\/2: The Final Insult.\u201d But putting aside that math, Neeson was happy to be associated with the \u201cAirplane!\u201d star\u2026 though he did have one condition in which he would definitely not have succeeded him. \u201cBut if the producers had said I must bleach my hair for the role, there\u2019s no way I would have done that,\u201d Neeson shared.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe Naked Gun,\u201d for most younger folk was \u2014\u00a0if anything \u2014\u00a0a movie series that ran a lot on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[49,48,75,1554,30306,23992,337,20811,23993],"class_list":{"0":"post-42544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-film","12":"tag-leslie-nielsen","13":"tag-liam-neeson","14":"tag-movies","15":"tag-pamela-anderson","16":"tag-the-naked-gun"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}