Elf's Department Store Fight Scene Had To Be Done In One Take
In the classic Holiday comedy "Elf," Buddy (Will Ferrell), a human raised as a Christmas elf on the North Pole, returns to New York City to find his father (played by the late James Caan, who couldn't keep a straight face on set). A fish out of water, Buddy fails to understand America's holiday traditions. Naturally, his ignorance gets him in a lot of trouble, including into a fight with a mall Santa, played by Artie Lange. According to Lange and director Jon Favreau, that scene had to be shot in only one take.
Buddy inadvertently lands a job at a Gimbels department store working as an elf. To his dismay, he discovers the mall Santa is not the one he grew up with on the North Pole. "He's an imposter!" Buddy yells to the crowd of children lined up to sit on Santa's lap. The mall Santa tackles Buddy into a Christmas tree and decorations, chases him, and swings a metal stanchion at him. He misses and instead smashes an elaborate Lego setup that resembles New York City complete with sky scrappers and a miniature train display. All of this happens amid the screaming children.
A big reason why that scene had to be shot in a single take is because the Lego setup took the set designers many hours over two weeks to build. "We shot right up until we destroy the place," Lange said during a 2017 episode of ABC's "20/20." "So, we had one take to destroy it. So Favreau says, 'Just go nuts, but we got one take.'" Favreau added: "They have to smash the whole [thing] — so we don't really have a lot of resets."
The verbal spat before the fight was improvised
While the fight itself was shot in only one take, the war of words between Buddy and the mall Santa that led up to the clash took many takes to complete, according to "20/20." More interestingly, the exchanges were largely improvised.
In the scene, the hired Santa sits on his throne with a 4-year-old boy sitting on his lap. Buddy runs up and interrogates him. My favorite part is when Buddy asks, "Well, if you're Santa, what song did I sing for you on your birthday this year?" and the mall Santa retorts, "Uh, 'Happy Birthday,' of course. Ho, Ho, Ho, Ho, Ho!" That line seems too perfect to be ad-libbed, but if Artie Lange did think of that response on the spot, he is a comedic genius. Will Ferrell's darn it, he's right facial expression made the clever retort even funnier.
But Ferrell comes back with some funny stuff of his own. Buddy retorts, "You stink. You smell like beef and cheese. You don't smell like Santa." That classic line is so enduringly popular you can still find it printed on the front of Christmas sweaters sold in the mall. This scene is just another example of how talented and naturally funny some comedians are. That reminds me: while we're on the topics of holiday movies and improv, did you hear about the time Steve Martin and John Candy's improv got out of hand on "Planes, Trains and Automobiles?"
Macy's didn't want a fake Santa in their store
Going back to "Elf," the movie's producers originally wanted to shoot the fight scene shot at Macy's in Manhattan. Unfortunately for them, they couldn't get the retailer on board. Macy's has a storied connection to the Holiday season. In 1861, the department store promoted that Kris Kringle himself dropped off his "finest gifts" there; this paved the way for "the meet Santa and tell him what you want for Christmas" tradition that remains in place today. In 1947, the Macy's Santa became the central character of the Christmas classic "Miracle on 34th Street."
Setting "Elf" in Macy's would have legitimized the movie, so it makes sense for the producers to reach out to the retailer. Unfortunately, Macy's was less than pleased by the script, particularly by the fact that the Santa gets exposed as a beef-and cheese-smelling phony. "They felt it would blow the illusion for kids," Jon Favreau told "20/20." Consequently, Macy's declined, which wasn't the first time the department store had turned down a movie. Though the 1994 "Miracle" remake may be one of John Hughes' best movies, the late filmmaker couldn't get the retailer on board. So, Hughes et al. came up with a fictitious store, Coles, and shot its scenes at the Art Institute of Chicago.
As for "Elf," they turned to Gimbels, the defunct department store that served as Macy's chief rival until it closed in 1987. "We approached the person that had the rights to Gimbels," Favreau said. "And we decided to set it in a building catty-corner to the Empire State Building." Some of the Gimbels scenes were even shot at an old, unoccupied asylum. Wow.