Jeff Bridges recalled being injected with novocaine before filming a poignant scene in Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.
During an appearance on the Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend podcast on Monday, the actor shared details about the ending of the 1974 movie, in which Lightfoot (Bridges) dies of a brain hemorrhage in a car alongside Thunderbolt (Clint Eastwood). The Big Lebowski star said he pulled director Michael Cimino aside at the time to suggest an "idea."
"That scene that you're talking about where I die in the car with Clint. I go up to Mike and I say, 'Mike, I've got an idea,'" he said.
Bridges remembered telling Cimino he "can hold a half blink pretty good," but advised they get a dentist to "shoot me with novocaine on the side of my face." Novocaine is a local anesthetic.
"And he said, 'Okay,' so we did that, and it worked great," the Golden Globe Award winner said.
He added, however, that they encountered a problem after filming.
"They lost the film," the 74-year-old shared. "We had to do the whole thing again."
"What?!" O'Brien replied. "Who comes in and tells you that?"
"That's unbelievable," O'Brien continued. "Because that's a very powerful ending where you think everything is okay, and then you realize that you're gone."
During their conversation, Bridges revealed another behind-the-scenes secret about filming Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.
"Clint only liked to do one take, maybe two," he said. After speaking with Cimino, however, Bridges said he was able to get "Boss" Eastwood to agree to more if needed.
"I love this movie," O'Brien said of Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. "It's Clint Eastwood, it's you, it's George Kennedy, it's a great f****** movie and I love that movie. And you popped so much."
Newsweek reached out to Bridges' team for additional comment.
Bridges grew up in a famous household. His father, Lloyd Bridges, was best known for his role as Mike Nelson in the 1950s series Sea Hunt, and his mom, Dorothy Bridges, was also an actor.
"I grew up with fame, you know? My dad was famous with Sea Hunt," he said, noting that going into his own film career was "natural" as a result. "Doesn't seem anything too special about that to me."
While reflecting further on his career, the Emmy Award nominee praised a special gift his wife, Susan Geston, gave him.
"As I think about the movies, I'm so fortunate to have discovered this camera, this Widelux camera that my wife gave me on our first anniversary," he said on the podcast. The couple wed in 1977.
"I've taken pictures while doing the movies, and I look at those books and they're like little lifetimes, you know? I remember all of those intense relationships and then poof—it's gone."
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