Kurt Russell Had To Kick Elvis Presley In The Shin For His First Movie Role
In Norman Taurog's 1963 film "It Happened at the World's Fair," Elvis Presley plays a crop-duster pilot named Mike whose crop-dusting plane was just repossessed by the local sheriff. While hitchhiking home, wondering how he'll get the money to buy back his plane, Mike comes upon the Seattle World's Fair. There, he instantly becomes smitten with a local nurse named Diane Warren (not to be confused with songwriter Diane Warren) played by Joan O'Brien.
To manufacture a reason to see the Fair's nurse, Mike pulls an 11-year-old boy out of the crowd and offers to pay the kid a quarter in exchange for a really, really hard kick to the shin. The kid is thrilled to have the money and dutifully thwacks the stranger. As Mike limps away, the kid mutters to himself "Adults. They're all nuts." The unnamed character was played by an uncredited Kurt Russell making his feature film debut.
Kurt Russell was active in show business from then on. From 1962 to 1965, the young lad appeared in the film "Guns of Diablo," and in single episodes of the TV shows "Dennis the Menace," "The Dick Powell Show," "Sam Benedict," "The Eleventh Hour," and "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." He also appeared on all 26 episodes of "The Travels of Jaime McPheeters." In 1969, he signed a 10-year contract with Disney, as the studio declared him the "next big thing." He starred in many films for the studio in that decade and hasn't stopped working since.
Russell has commented on his scene in "It Happened at the World's Fair" several times, including in a 2016 profile with GQ.
Kurt Russell and Elvis
Russell recalls Elvis Presley as being kind and approachable. Indeed, Russell recalled an incident wherein the King asked his father, Bing Russell, if he was allowed to wear his hat a certain way. Elvis had evidently seen Bing Russell on "Bonanza" — Bing Russell was also a professional actor — and wanted his permission to imitate his look. Kurt also recalled that his scene required multiple takes, saying:
"He had to wear a pad. [...] One time I got close to the edge of it and he looked at me, because he really trusted me, and went ' ... stay on the pad'. What a nice guy he was. Yeah. He was 27 years old."
Russell admits that he didn't know who Elvis Presley was at the time, as he was more into baseball than movies. In a profile for TCM, Russell recalled that filming "It Happened at the World's Fair" became increasingly strange and threatening as Elvis fans began to mob the set. Russell recalled crazed teens throwing themselves onto Elvis' car. Russell could only wonder if Elvis even liked that. Is being that beloved enriching, or is it terrifying?
Russell was also asked about his infamous kick on "The Graham Norton Show," where he reiterated that he didn't know how big Elvis was at the time.
It's also worth noting that Kurt Russell would go on to play Elvis Presley for director John Carpenter in the 3-hour TV miniseries "Elvis" in 1979. It was the first time he was considered a proper actor as an adult and not just a cute kid or a teen sensation. Russell would go on to star in Carpenter's films "Escape from New York," "The Thing," "Big Trouble in Little China," and "Escape from L.A."
3000 Miles to Graceland
Russell, having worked with Elvis and having played Elvis got to return to the King a few more times in his career. Russell was not credited, but he played the voice of Elvis Presley in Robert Zemeckis' 1994 Hollywood weepie "Forrest Gump," singing a few lines of "Hound Dog" and having a brief exchange with Sally Field. Peter Dobson played Elvis on camera in that film. The Elvis on the TV screen in "Forrest Gump" is the real Elvis.
Kurt Russell continued to be associated with Elvis with the release of Demian Lichtenstein's scuzzy 2001 heist movie "3000 Miles to Graceland." In that film, Russell and Kevin Costner played a pair of professional Elvis impersonators who, down on their luck and lacking a moral code, stage a heist at a Las Vegas casino. The plot is too complicated, it has an aggressive, off-putting tone, and the jokes aren't terribly funny, but "3000 Miles to Graceland" did let Russell spread his Elvis wings one more time.
Most recently, Russell has had the opportunity to star opposite another titan of cinema, Godzilla. In "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" Russell plays Lee Shaw in the 2015 timeframe. Russell's real-life son, Wyatt Russell, plays the same character in flashbacks. The series has run 10 episodes to date, and there hasn't yet been a scene wherein Russell kicks Godzilla in the shins for a quarter. Russell, now 73, would likely be game for such a thing.