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Movies are expensive things to make – and they’re getting more expensive all the time – so studios want to make sure they’re not going to get stuck with a box office bomb. However, Paramount needed more convincing than usual to greenlight The Naked Gun remake starring Liam Neeson. Beyond just seeing the script and the usual pitch binders, the executives at Paramount gave the director a budget to shoot a short pilot film as proof that the format could work, which included Liam Neeson breaking the fourth wall to bully them.

Director Akiva Schaffer, best known for his work with The Lonely Island, revealed the strange twist in the film’s conception in a recent interview. He explained that the studio executives needed a bit more convincing before they would give them the money to make The Naked Gun, so they gave him a small budget to shoot a scene as a kind of proof of concept.

“We got some day-player actors from L.A. to come be in it for the day. At the end of it, after Liam gets the criminal to break, he’s looking at the criminal, [says] ‘Don’t mess with me’ then turns to the camera,” Schaffer explains. “There’s that noir lighting on his face, and he says, ‘That goes for you, too. Yes, you, the Paramount greenlight committee. I see you there. What the fuck are you waiting for? Why don’t you get your pencil pushers to sign the line? I’ll tell you what. Make sure they have a line item for adult diapers and cocaine in case one of you ever wants to visit set’ or something like that. He basically talks shit to them and leaves. And it worked!”

That scene sounds like it would be perfectly at home in The Naked Gun, and we can only hope it turns up as an extra for the home release of the movie. Any time we see Liam Neeson being that special brand of intimidatingly funny that he seems to have adopted at this stage in his career, we’re in for a good time.

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