How a vomiting goalkeeper helped Werner Herzog create a classic
Werner Herzog is a true Renaissance man. In his 82 years on this earth, the iconoclastic German filmmaker has directed narrative features, documentaries, and even opera; acted in some of the biggest franchises in the world; written a dozen books; and publicly cooked and eaten his own shoe. Amazingly, that’s not even the strangest thing you can imagine the eccentric maverick doing. For some reason, it sounds more likely than something that is equally true about Herzog: he once played lower-league football in Germany. Not only that, but a goalkeeper vomiting on one of his scripts may have helped him birth one of his classic films.
During a 2014 interview with Vulture, Herzog was asked about the beautiful game, and he gave a series of wonderfully Herzog-esque responses. The journalist began talking about the World Cup, which was taking place that summer in Brazil, and Herzog confirmed he’d been watching some of the tournament. Instead of supporting his native Germany, though, Herzog was rooting for Costa Rica. Why? Because of their underdog status, of course.
The man more known for his neverending search for “ecstatic truth in film” proceeded to wax lyrical about the Costa Rican national team, who improbably gained tournament victories over Italy, Uruguay, and Greece on their way to the Quarter Finals. Herzog marvelled, “That’s the beauty of soccer. All of a sudden, there comes a team, we have never heard any of the names, and they run their lungs out of their bodies. And they fight. They are wonderful.”
Seeing an opening, the interviewer asked if it was true that a much younger Herzog played low-level football in Germany, as he claimed in his book Herzog on Herzog. Not only did he confirm the truth of the claim, but Herzog also described his attributes as a player, including an ability to read the game better than his teammates. By this, he meant he could see the picture in his mind of what would happen in a game before it occurred and could react accordingly. He mused, “I was good in goal scoring because I could read and sense what was coming and be at the right spot then, all of a sudden.”
Fascinatingly, while Herzog was playing his heart out on muddy pitches all over Germany, he was also feverishly writing screenplays and trying to kickstart his film career. As a writer, Herzog admits that he often finds the words come spilling out of him, telling The Guardian, “I write screenplays fast. I see a film happening before me as if I were in a screening room trying to note down everything while it’s being projected.”
Naturally, when the creative muse strikes him, Herzog isn’t one to wait until he has the perfect conditions to begin writing. Instead, he’ll write anywhere and everywhere, with whatever he has available to him. He once told Lit Hub, “I don’t care where I write. I can write…when I have the time for it or when I have to do my tax returns. Then I quickly write ten pages, which is three to four hours, or before I have to go to the pharmacy.”
Amazingly, Aguirre, the Wrath of God – Herzog’s seminal historical epic starring the legitimately terrifying Klaus Kinski – was banged out in a frenzied two days while his football teammates surrounded him on their bus. You see, the team was on a 200-mile trip to their next game, and things got a bit messy.
Herzog explained, “They were all drunk and chanting obscene songs. The goalkeeper vomited over my little typewriter that was on my knees. Two or three pages were beyond repair, so I threw them out of the window. I never remembered what was on them.”
The absurd tale sounds stranger than fiction, as do most things with Herzog. But it makes us think: What was on those pages? Considering Aguirre is an undisputed masterpiece, would those pages have upset the balance entirely? Did this spewing goalie inadvertently help create a piece of cinema history? It’s entirely possible.
