This Is The Army Of Darkness Scene That Sent Bruce Campbell To The ER
When you've been through the trials and tribulations of getting an "Evil Dead" movie made, it's no wonder Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi have remained the best of friends. Almost anything that could go wrong on that chaotic set, short of someone dying, did, and yet "The Evil Dead" emerged on the other side as one of the most prolific horror movies ever made. It's all due to the sheer amount of creative talent it took just to get it finished. "Evil Dead II" and "Army of Darkness" followed in the years to come. While they weren't nearly as dangerous as the "Evil Dead" shoot, that didn't mean they were always in for smooth sailing, especially if you were Campbell.
When the pair are in "Evil Dead" mode, Campbell is willing to do whatever it takes to get the shot. You only have to look at five seconds of "Evil Dead II" to see Campbell turn into a real trooper with the kind of heavy slapstick Raimi has waiting for him. It's a tradition that has lasted over four decades, with the latest being the self-punching Pizza Poppa gag from "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness." If there's a way for Raimi to insert some slapstick for his good buddy to endure, then he's going to do it.
Campbell has largely come out on the other side relatively unscathed, barring an incident like a leg wound from "The Evil Dead" where he just had to work through the pain with no medical treatment readily available. But a particular slip-up from "Army of Darkness," which is celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2023, forced Campbell to take a trip to the Emergency Room.
Campbell took a nasty scrape on his face
While shooting the climax of "Army of Darkness," there's a moment where Bruce Campbell flips a stuntman playing one of the Deadite skeletons over some stairs. He ended up getting a cut on his face that required making a pit stop to the ER, where Campbell had a hilarious interaction with the doctor assigned to him. As he explained on the film's home media commentary track:
"The doctor that they got to sew me up looked in my face and there was already six or seven cuts on my face. He was like, 'Which one is cut?' And then, of course, he had to get his little dig in. As he stitched me up, he goes 'That one, these other cuts, they don't look very real.' It's like, yeah, but you didn't know when I first came in here which one was the real cut."
The doctor that stitched Campbell up seems like one of those folks who watch a horror movie with the intention of not being scared, end up jumping, and then try to convince everyone else that it didn't actually scare them. I think it's pretty awesome that the makeup was so good that it initially fooled a medical professional.
It's not unlike the "Friday the 13th: Part II" incident when Jason actor Steve Dash was rushed to the hospital after a machete slip-up nicked his hand. But he still had the fake machete lodged in his shoulder, which naturally frightened the hospital workers. Anyone that needs to take a trip to the ER would naturally want to rest up from an incident like nearly getting skewered in the face, but Campbell had other plans.
Campbell wasted no time getting back to work
As he talked about on the "Army of Darkness" commentary track, Bruce Campbell didn't waste any time after getting stitched up and just headed right back to set:
"I just came right back and got to work because you couldn't really tell if I had one extra cut on my face. It didn't matter. It wasn't like a soap opera, where you had to look perfect all the time."
He's not wrong. Given how many scrapes Ash gets himself into, one more cut among the rest really wouldn't stick out. If anything, it only fits more in line with the character taking a beating during the movie's climax. I tried going back to see if I could place the real one from the fake one in the actual film, and I'll be damned if they don't all look pretty great.
Props to the makeup department for making Campbell look as if he had just arrived at the ER after fighting a hoard of Deadites. It's surprising that he hasn't been hurt more, given how much Campbell carries himself whenever he's tasked with performing slapstick comedy. But besides some potato pelting and a scrape to the face, he left the "Army of Darkness" set relatively intact. As for the film itself? That's a whole different story.
"Army of Darkness" is currently available for rental or purchase on most VOD streaming platforms.