Harrison Ford: The actor who makes Brendan Fraser feel like a “fanboy”
The most famous role of his career – and the one that rocketed him to bankable leading man status – was that of Rick O’Connell in 1999 adventure favourite The Mummy, making it a fortuitous bout of coincidence that Brendan Fraser eventually co-starred with the actor who served as a major inspiration on the character.
Any charming and charismatic adventurer with a habit of getting caught up in world-threatening supernatural situations while sporting khaki in the desert is inevitably going to invite comparisons to Indiana Jones, with Fraser happy to acknowledge the impact Raiders of the Lost Ark had on his own career.
As he admitted to A.Frame of Steven Spielberg’s classic blockbuster, “If that isn’t an influence in my oeuvre, I would be a liar”. Sure enough, the similarities are there for all to see, given O’Connell’s penchant for a quip, handiness in a fight, and status as the central figure in a wildly successful trilogy, to name but three.
In addition, Raiders also made the star “a lifelong Harrison Ford fan,” which was “cemented” when Fraser saw Blade Runner for the very first time. Calling Ridley Scott’s seminal sci-fi “a masterpiece” is a sentiment shared by many, but it was another one of Ford’s intergalactic credits that saw the Academy Award winner go full-blown fanboy.
The pair played the two leading roles in Tom Vaughn’s 2010 medical drama Extraordinary Measures, and while it ended up bombing at the box office amidst an overall reception that could generously be described as apathetic, Fraser got to fulfil one of his greatest fantasies.
As he explained, joining Ford for one of his extracurricular habits opened the doors to the experience of a lifetime: “He called me one weekend and said, ‘What are you doing?’ I said, ‘Nothing.’ He’s like, ‘Can you go to the airport?’ ‘Sure.’ He’s like, ‘Now.’ I got in a cab, I went to the airport, and he took me for a ride.”
Continuing, he reflected on how “he took me up on his plane a couple of times, actually”. Instead of being Fraser, the renowned thespian soaring through the skies with Ford, the A-list superstar, the former instead opted to indulge in another one of his all-time favourite movies: “I was Chewbacca. I got to be his co-pilot; he gave me the stick for a little while.”
Understandably, The Whale headliner was giddy with delight. Coming clean, Fraser conceded that “I’m a fanboy clearly” but noted that in addition to indulging his devotion to Star Wars, Ford is “just a really cool guy.”
Given how the iconic Han Solo has constantly made it clear that constantly being asked about George Lucas’ sci-fi spectacular is something he’s long since grown weary of, though, it remains unanswered as to whether or not Fraser had the confidence to compare himself to Chewbacca mid-flight.
